I’ve been reading The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House, by John F. Harris. It’s an excellent recap of the Clinton years. Reading it gives me the odd sensation of reliving not just the events in the book, but events of my own life. Clinton opened his presidential campaign just a month after I started college and a mere six weeks after I returned to the U.S. from living overseas. He left office four days after I started this blog and several months into my legal career.

I remember going down to Richmond with the UVa Democrats for a debate-watching party/rally in 1992 and getting to shake Clinton’s hand when he came to the rally afterward. I remember watching the Election Night returns in my tiny New College (now Hereford) dorm room. I remember rushing back from my first American Lit class of the Winter 1993 semester to watch the inauguration on TV. I remember driving up Route 29 to D.C. that summer, listening to a talk radio discussion about the B.T.U. tax. Watching a news report over winter break one year about the impending transfer of Congress to the Republicans… reading about the Oklahoma City bombings in the New York Times in the reading room of Alderman Library, a month from graduation… following the re-election story in my Range room while a first-year law student… first hearing about the Lewinsky affair while watching TV in my living room during my second year of law school… studying for finals the following year in the Glee Club house while the House voted to impeach… watching his airplane-hangar farewell speech in my Jersey City living room after the Bush inauguration.

For me, the Clinton years are synonymous with my UVa years, and both are synonymous with the 1990s. It’s all one big nostalgiafest, and it makes the book that much more enjoyable to read.