Episode 110: A Conversation 32 Years In the Making with Rory Woonsue

Coffee & Change

Imagine being able to go back and have a conversation with your 12 year old self. Imagine being able to share all the things you had learned along the way, to celebrate your unwavering resilience, to honor your fortitude and most importantly admire your compassion for change. While it may not seem achievable, this next conversation with Rory Woonsue did just that, for both the host and the guest. See, I met Rory when I was 12 years old and we were both in the 7th grade in Warsaw, Poland. It was a historic time - Gulf War, Reunification of Germany, the fall of the Soviet Union. All this was taking place around us while we were trying to salvage our childlike wonder, and hold on to our innocence. The world around us was changing fast, and we had no choice but to try and find our way in the world, in a post communist country, while navigating adolescence behind the Iron Curtain. This conversation was a salve on a wound I didn't know I had been ignoring for multiple decades. It was in this connection, reignited from a place of forgiveness and laughter, grace and gratitude, that allowed us both to heal and pay it forward for the next generation. As they say in Polish, Sto Lat! (100 Years!) Here's to friendship, no matter what.