Nice to be Old

There are nice things about being old (I've decided to adopt Ronni Bennett's pride in being "old" vs. "elderly" or "older" or other euphemism. After living 67+ years, I should have pride in having...well...lived 67+ years and embrace the fact that I am now old. Besides, being "old" gives you license to get away with lots of stuff you can't when you're young or middle aged and have to be respectable!).

One of the nice things about being old is that you get to reconnect with people you used to know many years ago.

The reunion was a good thing. I reconnected with several classmates I hadn't seen in 50 years. Nothing blossomed into a friendship renewal kind of thing, but then that's OK. Just seeing how they turned out and hearing what they are doing today was fun. Seeing them with their spouses (those who brought them) was fun. Seeing a teacher from more than 50 years ago and interacting with her on an equal level (sharing a glass of wine, for example), was fun.

Something else that is fun is being contacted by an old classmate, sort of out of the blue, and meeting her for breakfast.

Five years ago, I got an e-mail from a guy who had stumbled across Funny the World and read something I had written about nuns that I had in school and saw that I had attended St. Vincent High School. His wife went there too. As it turned out she and I not only knew each other, but we had been to both grammar and high school with each other. She was a year ahead of me in school and I still remember that her father had built her a special left-handed desk and when she graduated, she willed it to me.

Anyway, she and I exchanged a couple of e-mails and then a year later, came the message that she and her husband would be traveling through Davis and would we like to meet? It seems that the husband grew up here in Davis, so they pass by once or twice a year.

We arranged to meet and had a thoroughly enjoyable lunch, I thought, which I documented in this journal. They said they had really enjoyed meeting us and that they would definitely contact us the following year when they were back in town again.

Only we never heard from them again. Being the person that I am, I assumed that they really hadn't enjoyed meeting us at all and so had written us off. I was sad about that, but shrugged it off.

Now here we are four years later and after the reunion, I sent a link to all the photos and video to my former classmate. I received a reply almost immediately thanking me and saying that they were actually going to be going through town again and would we like to meet for breakfast again? (The last time they were here, I said that next time we'd have them to our house...but that was before 6 dogs. It was before the dogs ate the living room carpet. It was before the living room became a puppy potty. It was when having guests was still a remote possibility!)

As it turned out, they hadn't written us off, but had lost my e-mail address and thought we hadn't liked them and were hiding from them. (See what kind of self esteem is built in students after 12 years of Catholic school?)

So we met at the same restaurant today for a breakfast that lasted nearly 2 hours. As before, the years crumbled away and we chatted as if it had only been yesterday that we were in this same place together. Her husband is so personable that he and Walt hit it off right away, both times.

We compared notes on a lot of things and the husband offered some good insights about travel to Helsinki (which he loves). Fortunately there weren't many other patrons in the restaurant, so we felt comfortable just sitting there talking, and talking and talking. Walt and I both left feeling so good about having had this chance to spend time with them again.

We've promised to meet again the next time they are coming to this area, and I hope it's not another four years. There were topics touched upon but not explored that I would like to get into in more detail when we are together again next time.

Ordinarily I would post a photo of this meeting, but I remembered from last time that she doesn't like having her photo taken, so I brought the camera to photograph my breakfast, which I did while she went to the ladies' room. But I didn't even ask to take her photo. That's so unlike me!!!