Lunch with Peter Pan

I had lunch with Peter Pan today.

Well, she used to be Peter Pan.

My former roommate, Jeannie, was going to be passing through Sacramento today and suggested that we meet for lunch. The last time we saw each other, I was pregnant with either Tom or Paul...or maybe David. Suffice to say it was a long time ago.

I found a picture of my first roommate, Judi, the one I didn't get along with. Perhaps the fact that she appears only by accident in the background of a group photo give some sort of indication of how I felt about her.

This was our little home on the hill on the campus of UC Berkeley. When looking for lodging before I moved to Berkeley, I secifically chose Mitchell Hall because it was the smallest dorm on campus and I was terrified at the idea of going into a big dorm my first time away from home. I think Mitchell had 50 girls compared to >100 in the other dorms in this 4-building complex and many more in the "new" dorms down on the flat. Also, living in Mitchell meant I got lots of exercise since I had to climb the long hill up Dwight Way every day.

At the end of my first disastrous semester as Judi's roommate, Jeannie took pity on me and invited me to be her roommate. I was delighted.

As I said, Jeannie had been Peter Pan. There was a park called Children's Fairyland in Oakland (it still exists) which was a favorite of little tots and hired older kids (maybe high school age?) to dress as various storybook characters.

I don't know how long Jeannie was Peter Pan, but what a perfect person to play the part. With the air of magic about her and how much she even looked like Mary Martin at the time, they must have hired her without much of an audition.

Her love of Mary Martin was one of the things that helped us be good roommates...she had a passion for Mary Martin that matched mine for Judy Garland, only I had met Judy Garland and she has received a personal letter from Mary Martin.

I have had great guilt for many years about our two semesters together as roommates. During the Judi semester, I had run away to Newman Hall and established a social life there so I didn't have to interact with Judi. Consequently I wasn't the close roommate that I'm sure Jeannie expected because of my social life at Newman, which kept me away from the dorm much of the time (though she did tell me today that I hadn't been such a bad roommate, so I finally feel better about that!)

We met for lunch at a Thai restaurant Marta had recommended and we sat and talked for 2½ hrs over some of the best pad thai I've ever had. We discovered that there was no awkwardness, despite the passage of >40 years. We slipped into chatter as if we had just seen each other yesterday.

We talked about our time at the dorm, and I was pleased when she rolled her eyes when I mentioned Judi. She also remember Char and I gave her the history of the Pinata Group. We discussed our grandchildren and books we had read.

We talked computers and cell phones. We talked music, and her feeling that her husband, who was a music teacher, would love to talk with Jeri, should the occasion arise. We also talked theater, since her husband has done lighting design and they have been active in theater (mostly in the musical part) for many years.

Jeannie has a masters degree in religious studies and she now teaches English to a group of Afghani women, which led to a discussion about the middle east. . She positively glows when she talks about her students and proudly showed off pictures of them. I swear, if more people would get to know people of other nationalities, colors, sexual orientation, religion, there would be less hate and more friendship in the world.

We compared notes on places where we had both been (especially the South of France, which we both loved).

The time just flew by and I was sad that we both had to leave. We parted in the parking lot with the hope that we will find an excuse to get together sooner than 40 years from now.

I was so pleased to discover the same person I remember from so long ago, just a little bit older, but still with that sparkle of pixie dust in her eyes and an enthusiasm for life that I remembered so fondly. She is Peter Pan, all grown up, but retaining the magic that made her special in the first place..

Performance Anxiety

Gosh. Now I'm under the gun to be clever and creative. I hate it when that happens. (Not really).

Y'all remember a couple of days ago when I was whining about nobody liking me and how I was gonna go out and eat worms and stuff like that.

Well, today they liked me. They really liked me.

Back in the 1970s, we lived in Oakland. Char and Mike lived in Oakland too. We lived in the same neighborhood. Our kids went to school together. Char and Mike moved south of San Francisco, Walt and I moved here to Davis and we didn't really have much contact with the families that we knew who stayed behind in Oakland.

I suppose I never was all that close to many families other than our Pinata friends. Char had a wider circle of friends. But I do remember the people that we knew and enjoyed chatting with when our paths crossed.

So when Char said she was having lunch with two of them, Fran and Sue, and invited me to go along, I was happy to say yes. I have seen Sue, off and on, over the years at social functions, but we moved from 1973 and I don't think I've seen Fran since then.

It was fun driving into the old neighborhood again. I met Char at Fran's house and together we drove to the Montclair Golf and Country Club to meet Sue.

What a great time we had! It was like falling back into a place we had been 30+ years before. When I got home, Walt asked me questions like "what is so-and-so doing now?" and "where is so-and-so living now." Heck, we didn't talk about stuff like that. We just chatted like we had seen each other last week.

We talked about travel and shared funny stories. Char regaled everyone with her tales of Petropavlovsk, Kamchatka, one of the trips we didn't make with them (and I'm not sure if I'm sad or happy about that!). We laughed about things we remembered about our children (Char's daughter Jenny once brought Fran's son home from kindergarten--kind of a "he followed me, can I keep him" moment. That's how Char met Fran, when she called to let her know that she had her son. Fran was very relieved!)

Fran asked if we like to play cards (we all did) and said that she misses having someone to play cards with, so we have naturally all decided to get together after the holidays and play cards. (I may have to teach them 65, which Char insists is too complicated a game)

Fortunately the Golf Club restaurant had very little business, because we sat and talked and talked and talked long after we had finished our lunch. Char told them they'd read about themselves in this journal, and I passed out cards with the URL. I went home on a real high.

This evening Walt and I went to Thai Nakorn restaurant, which is located next door to Walt's old office. They were donating 15% of the price of each meal tonight toward Thailand Flood Relief, so we had a fantastic dinner of curried duck and pad thai. The owners of the place always welcome Walt like a long lost friend and they give us a free dessert at the end of the meal. Usually it's sticky rice with mango, but tonight it was something different:

This was described as Thai jelly on top of some jellied coffee mixture. Definitely different but decidedly delicious!

We MUST Get Together Sometime

"Next time you're in the area, let me know and we'll get together." How many times have I heard that?

I'm thinking of one particular friend, whom I have not seen in more than 25 years, though she lives in the Bay Area. Periodically, I send her an e-mail and she always responds with delight, happy to hear from me, sad that it has been so long since we have seen each other, and telling me to let her know when I'm going to be in the area and we will get together.

I always have the same response...that when I'm in the area, it's usually for something specific, but I'm more than happy to make the drive down specifically for lunch with her and suggest that she let me know when she is free. Then I don't hear from her again until I write again.

I actually thought we might make it this year. We were honing in on specific dates and she said she would be house sitting, and would get back to me when she was home again. That was before we left for China.

I don't know if this is a common thing, but I'm beginning to get a complex about it, the number of people who say that they want to get together for lunch or dinner or whatever and that they will "get back to me" about it, and then never do, until the next time we talk, when they tell me again that they really want to get together with me. There is one friend who took 20 years before we finally did get together. We had so much fun, she said, that we needed to do it again, sooner this time. Whenever we talk, she reminds me that we are going to get together, either after the rain stops or when it's not so hot, or when their lives aren't all that busy.

Some tell me that I'm so busy that I should call them whenever I have free time. I always respond that really I'm not that busy and if they give me a couple of dates, I'm sure I can free up the time. But they never do.

I searched for a childhood friend for many years, unable to find her because she had married and I didn't know her married name. I finally connected with a mutual friend, who gave me my friend's contact information. We actually spoke on the phone. "When you're next in the area, call me," she said. I gave her my standard "I'd be happy to make a special trip to see you again, just let me know when you're free." She promised to get back to me, but never did.

One of our foreign students has been going to get together with us and mutual friends for about four years now. We actually do get together with this group occasionally, but it's never "soon," but more like three or four years between visits. There is a real posibility that someone in this group will die before we get together again. I last wrote to suggest that we do it soon. I was told that they would get back to me soon. I'm still waiting.

A former co-worker tells me every Christmas that we should get together for lunch after the holidays. I tell her I'm ready whenever she is. I haven't seen her in more than five years. She's never "ready."

"I'll talk to you after you return from China," said a friend before our trip. It's been nearly six months now and, despite attempts on my part to contact her, there has been no response.

You get a complex, you know? What did I do? What did I say? Why am I OK to talk to and to promise getting together, but why do so few people really want to make a date to get together after all?

(Or maybe I should just give up and try to live by this saying.)

It makes me understand why my father was such a hermit in the years before he died. It's easier to hide in the house and do my own thing -- writing, watching TV, reading, whatever -- than to face the rejection by friends you thought enjoyed your company, but who apparently don't really.

(That said, however, I am having lunch with Char and two friends I haven't seen in years this week. SOMEbody loves me!)

Mid-Night Panic

What goes through your mind when the telephone rings in the middle of the night?

We've had "those" calls in the middle of the night, bringing tragic or sad news, so when I was awakened from my sleep at 1:30 a.m. this morning by the sound of the telephone ringing, I froze. It was one of those nights when I was sleeping on the couch. The phone is in the family room, so I knew Walt would pick it up upstairs before I could get to it.

I listened carefully through the ceiling to see if I could tell whether he was talking or not (or if this was a wrong number). I couldn't tell. But then I heard the sound of his feet hitting the floor and the bedroom door opening.

My heart started pounding. Who was it? Was my mother dead? Had Kathy finally died? Did something happen to one of the kids--or one of the grandkids?

Walt came into the living room laughing. "It was XX," he said. "He is leaving his house right now and wants to now if he can stop by for a visit in about 8 hours." We had not spoken to or seen XX since about 2002. We've exchanged a few rare comments on Facebook, but that's it.

My heart was still pounding, but I laughed with Walt, shaking my head at the thought that XX felt it would be OK to wake us up in the middle of the night with a call he could have made when he was closer to Davis and when we would be more likely to be awake and not fearful that the phone was ringing to deliver bad news.

It took me about an hour to calm down and get back to sleep. The last time I looked at the clock, it was 2:45. I was glad, at least, that the living room was pristine since we have not started putting all the "stuff" back in (hoping for some muscle help from Ned to get the bigger pieces moved). I wouldn't be embarrassed to invite him into the living room...it didn't even smell of dog pee.

I was wide awake at 6, still thinking about how to do a day-long clean up of the family room in an hour. I also suspected that XX might be wanting breakfast. I need to do shopping to stock the larder, so my options were limited, but I was able to whip up some cranberry muffins in case he was hungry.

The kitchen table has been piled high with the usual "miscellaneous sundries" for days weeks months, but I got everything packed into shopping bags, which I can then go through, hoping to get everything either thrown out or put in its proper place after XX left.

By 8:30, I was as ready as I would ever be for semi-unexpected guests. It helps that XX has seen this house at its worst--and even stayed here for a couple of days and survived. It also helps that his house, the last time I saw it, was about on a par, mess-wise, with this one. We are both stackers and pilers and "housekeeping" is low on our list of priorities.

At 9 he showed up and yes, he was ready for breakfast so I was glad I had planned ahead. Unfortunately, Walt had a meeting in Sacramento, and was not able to be here, though he was just leaving as XX arrived, so at least they got to say hello to each other.

Nothing ever really changes with XX, but...you know? ...it was really nice getting caught up after nearly 10 years. We laughed, we gossiped about people we used to know, we talked technology and television. He tried to make friends with Polly (who was having none of it), and when his muffin was gone, he said it was time to leave; he had an appointment and it was going to cut it close as it was. He had already traveled about an hour out of the way to come here as it was.

He had been here less than an hour, he had places to be and people to meet and, except for the mid-night panic about the phone call, I was genuinely happy to see him again. I hope it won't be another 7 years before we see each other.

And after he was gone, I went through all the grocery bags, to put all the stuff away, and maybe the kitchen table will stay relatively clean for another day or two.

Good Deeds

I had the most delightful day today ... and it's not often people say that about a day that starts with getting a cavity filled.

But, as I've said before, going to Cindy's dental office, for me, is as pleasant as going to the beauty shop -- actually more pleasant, because there is never any pain and I get a chance to get caught up on Cindy's life. She was filling a small cavity today and I learned a lot about her that I hadn't before, and we found the diagnosis for one of my problems too, so it was win-win-win all around.

After the appointment, I was having lunch with two women, one of whom I knew and one of whom I did not know. Because part of this may be of a sensitive nature, I'm going to make up names for them.

Let's call them Edith and Ellen. I've known Edith almost the entire time I've lived in Davis. Sometimes our relationship is closer than other times, but I've always known her and our kids went to school together.

Ellen was a stranger to me, but a friend of Edith's had called her to say that this friend of hers (Ellen) needed some information about on-line publishing and social networking. Edith thought of me and asked if I'd be interested in meeting with them. Of course I said yes.

One of the things I love about Edith is that we speak the same language--the language of computers. It is rare to come across women of our age who have been working with computers as long as we have, and what is more, who love learning new things and who got in on the ground floor of a lot of things that many people our age are just now beginning to realize that they should learn about.

Ellen invited us to come to her house for lunch, and we did. It was a beautiful day, cool enough that we could sit in the back yard to eat without worrying that it was going to be too hot. She brought out a plate of cheese, turkey pastrami, stuffed eggs that had cumin in them (I must try that--they were delicious!), some bread from one of the local bakeries, and home grown tomatoes. She, of course, had me at home grown tomatoes. I sat there looking at her big tomato bush, filled with red, ripe tomatoes, and eating these full flavored chunks that I just loved.

We talked about writing for a long time. That was another wonderful thing--we are all three writers. We compared styles of writing and talked about things that we have written and published and the various ways we have published books, and their success or lack of same.

Ellen's main problem is self-promotion, with which she feels very uncomfortable. We gave her some good ideas of how to promote herself and her book without coming across like the Fuller Brush girl and without having to beat the drum too loudly, but some low-key ways to at least think about starting.

We gave her the good and bad points about using social networking and tips about how to get people to help her publicize her books.

But then there was a bit of serendipity and a proof that sometimes doing a good deed, helping someone else, can be a very big thing. When we were talking about books we had published, Edith mentioned a book she had written for a non-profit organization with which she has been involved, how it was published, how it helped to raise a bit of money for the organization.

Ellen stopped her. "You work with XXX?" she asked. Edith said that she did and went on a bit about the financial problems the organization is having at the moment, and the discussions they were having with a lending organization.

"I'm on the board of that organization," Ellen said, incredulously. The talk then turned to the negotiations underway and how Ellen felt about the organization. The upshot is that she already had a meeting scheduled with the head of the organization tomorrow and she is going to talk to her about easing the situation for Edith's organization.

I don't know if that is going to actually happen, but what a bit of serendipity just because we were willing to go and help a stranger with her problem.

Sometimes life helps you make lemonade out of lemons!

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!!!

We Must Do This More Often

Today was another one of those lunches with people I used to see frequently and rarely see any more. And at the end of it, we said the same thing everybody else has said -- "This was such fun, we must do this more often."

Maybe this is what happens when you get older. Suddenly you realize that you miss the people who used to be close to you years ago.

Today's lunch was with Cindy (my dentist) and Roberta, with whom Cindy and I used to work, and with whom I share a birthday. I told Cindy it was nice to see the lower part of her face, since it seems that all I have seen of her in a long time was the part that goes above the mask she wears in the office! She arranged lunches for the three of us for many years around the time of Roberta's and my birthday. But we hadn't done it in several years.

Cindy had prepared a fabulous spinach salad for lunch and we sat there getting caught up on our lives and our children, until her daughter called. The daughter, who is attending the university here in town, lives in a duplex that Cindy and her husband own. There was an electrician there to do some work and the daughter had to get to class. Cindy invited Roberta and me to continue our lunch, have dessert, make coffee if we wanted, and let ourselves out when we were finished, because she had to go to the house.

So we did that. We continued our visit, had dessert and then left, with promises to get together more often.

This "we have to do this more often" is already coming around for a second date very soon. Ruth and I, who went to the Chinese buffet last week, will be having lunch again next week here in Davis and my friend Kathy, from La Leche League and PFLAG, will be having lunch at Sacramento's Olive Garden again the week after that...and the week after that is Cousins Day. The weekend of the 13th I was just invited to a party for a woman I went to high school with--I haven't seen her since 1960.

I feel almost as social as my mother! I actually have a FULL calendar! I love it.

In the evening, we were scheduled to meet Ned & Marta; Tom, Laurel and Bri; and Jessica with her toddler Jack at Sudwerk for a birthday dinner. It was going to work out fine. We would meet them at 6 and I could still get to the theatre in time to review Kiss Me Kate at 8.

Only traffic and weather slowed Tom & Laurel, so they called and we rescheduled until 7:00, by which time Sudwerk was filled and we had a half an hour wait for a table. Just looking at how crowded it was, I could tell I wasn't going to get dinner. But I did order a plate of mini crab cakes (4 of them, about 1-1/2" across each) and a glass of water.

Tom finally arrived and the old man and his sons had a good time visiting with each other.

Bri and Jack enjoyed each other too.

Just about the time the waitress finally came by to take our order, it was time for me to leave, so I took a picture of everyone, gave hugs all around and went to the theatre.

Walt made it to the theatre just at the end of the first act, so it's good I didn't try to have any dinner. I got myself a cookie at intermission and came home to have some leftover chili in a tortilla for a late dinner.

But I think Walt had a good birthday, all things considered. He had lots of e-mails wishing him well, a call from each person in the family, a visit with Char in the afternoon, checking out her cousin's new bookstore downtown, and then dinner with everybody...and he had a nice nap during Kiss Me Kate. What more could a 70 year old want, except maybe a nap?

Birthin' Babies 'n' Stuff

What a great lunch I had today. My friend Kathy and I used to meet for lunch two or three times a year, but the last time we got together, her daughter was pregnant with a second child, a little girl who is now four years old! So it's been awhile. We were pleased to see that neither of us has changed in the past four years (yeah...right).

Kathy and I have a long history together, going back to my early days in Davis, when we were both involved with La Leche League. She didn't live in Davis so I'm not quite sure how I got to know her, but I did. Over the time we worked together, she became a leader too.

We worked together with other women on presenting a national La Leche League conference in Sacramento. Some of the most fun -- and funniest -- times I remember. La Leache League was founded back in 1956 by seven women who were breastfeeding their babies and who saw a need for a group to give support to other women who wanted to nurse their babies.

In those days, you were considered weird if you breastfed. Today when I see that it is assumed you will breastfeed, at least initially, for however short or long you decide, I think back on the days we tried to talk to doctors and nurses in obstetrical offices and hospitals and were laughed out of the places. It's a great feeling of satisfaction to know that the change in thinking is something that we were a part of.

But when we were planning the convention here in the Sacramento area, we began laughing once about the 7 founding mothers as being like the 7 dwarfs and trying to decide which mother was which dwarf (seems to me we all agreed on who Dopey was). Anyway, I have never since then -- and we're talking 30 years or more here -- been able to hear about the founders of La Leche League without thinking of Dopey and the other six founding mothers.

Kathy paid me a lovely compliment about those days today, which really has put me in a good mood for the whole rest of the day.

She went on to do childbirth education, which moved her up the corporate ladder into management. She has received national recognition for her contribution to women's issues.

She also has a gay child and so our friendship was renewed when we both found PFLAG and I marched with her and PFLAG in a couple of Gay Pride parades in San Francisco.

I worked with her PFLAG group occasionally, especially when my friend Steve became a featured singer at a memorial service held at a local Church to remember all of those who have died of AIDS.

A couple of years later, we attended the memorial service of one of the planners of that event, who learned that he had AIDS (after testing clear every year prior to that) just days before his death from pneumocystis pneumonia.

We watched our children grow up and become parents themselves. We've shared tragedies together. And today we realized (as I am so fortunate to have realized with a handful of other people throughout my life) how very special it is to meet up with people with whom you have lost track many years after your last meeting, and to take up where you left off, with very little need to play "catch up."

Today we were back at the Olive Garden, having minestrone soup and salad and chatting as if we had just seen each other last week.

I love it when that happens.

---

We're taking off for our annual trip to So. California to see "Says You" tomorrow. Ashley and at least four other dogs are moving in here while we're gone. In a way I wish I could be a fly on the wall to see how her 4 (or is it 5? It's her own dogs plus two fosters) mix with the four we have here. If you're planning to rob our house, I wouldn't try it this weekend. Judging from the way our two current fosters tried to attack Phil and later Ned, adding another four dogs to the mix is not going to make breaking in here any easier! (And the pickings for self-respecting thieves is so slim, it's definitely not worth it...all the "good stuff" will be with me, mostly in my purse! Unless, of course, you're into SPCA towels and shredded rugs.

I'll have the computer with me and I hope to continue journal entries as usual, but on the off chance that entries aren't posted when you expect them, that's why.

Simply Shocking

I was electrocuted today. Deliberately. With my permission.

When I saw the doctor a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned the numbness in my little finger. I know that peripheral neuropathy is one of the possible side effects of diabetes and was concerned. She dangled the carrot of possible ulnar nerve impingement in front of me and suggested I have a nerve conduction study just to check it out.

They don't do that in Davis, or even in Sacramento, so I had to drive farther up the foothills to Roseville to meet with the delightful Dr. Lai, whom I assumed was a man,but who definitely was not. She proceeded to spend 15 minutes electrocuting me.

It's not the most pleasant test you can take...given my choice, I might choose another sigmoidoscopy over having this done again, but I once again gave thanks for all that training in LaMaze breathing that I took during my birthin' babies years, which I used a lot, trying to concentrate on muscle relaxation, and not on the jolts of electricity surging through various parts of my hand. On a scale of 1-10, I'd put the discomfort level at about a 3-4, though, so it really wasn't all that bad. Just not much fun.

And guess what? I have an inflammation of the ulnar nerve. Who knew I'd be happy to have what amounts to carpal tunnel of the elbow? They can do surgery, but given that this is not impacting on my life there seemed no point, and I, for one, was certainly not going to demand it. She suggested keeping my right arm extended straight out whenever possible in hopes of easing the pressure on the nerve, which is a little difficult when you spend so many hours at the keyboard. But for the moment, I'm just going to leave it alone and see if it gets worse...and keep the arm straightened out whenever I can (I just noticed that I was resting my head in my hand, with elbow bent on the desk as I was re-reading this. Must change that habit!)

After my appointment, I spent an absolutely delightful afternoon visiting my "big sister," Joycie.

When I entered St. Vincent High School, everyone in the freshman class was assigned a big sister, who would put us through a silly initiation ritual and then help us adjust to the school.

Most of the big sisters never had anything to do with their little sisters once initiation was over, but Joycie and I have remained friends all of our lives, as the photo on the left shows. The first picture is from my initiation in 1956, the second is in 1966, both of us holding our daughters (Jeri is just a few months older than Robin), and the bottom photo was from today. (Note that my hair style has not changed in 53years!!!)

Joycie and her husband Bob used to live in San Diego, but moved up to this area several years ago to be near daughter Robin. For all these years we have been "going" to get together, but it just never happened. But with my appointment being only about half an hour from their house, it would have been silly not to stop by and see them.

I called Joycie from Kaiser and she gave me directions on getting to their house, but I write down lousy directions and once I'd gotten off the freeway I was hopelessly lost, but then remembered I had a perfectly good GPS in the trunk of the car, so I got that out and used it for the very first time--and it unerringly took me right to their door.

I got a tour of their "new" home (as well as an introduction to the wild turkey wandering around in the back yard) in the foothills. We had a nice lunch and talked over old times and new times. We discussed politics (fortunately we agree on everything) and television programs (we like all the same things) and computers (we are all addicted).

I was amused to see the line of Sponge Bobs on top of Bob's computer.

We took the inevitable photos, with her camera and with mine, and then I got ready to go, with promises of coming back with Walt again next time. Though, given how long it's taken to get this meeting accomplished, some of us may be dead before that happens!

Still, it was just a wonderful afternoon. It's really nice when you reunite with someone who has known you for almost your whole life and discover that the friendship is as strong now as it always was, despite time and distance.

Brief Encounters

I got to get together with the women of the writing group again, after several months. It wasn't actually a writing group gathering, but rather a gathering of women who like to knit and crochet (not me) but it was held at the senior citizen apartment complex where we usually had our meetings and Joan invited me to go along.

It was a surprise to see the large group there (since there were only 4-5 of us writers when we got together), and then to see the groaning board of snacks. We took over one table in the corner and I was the only one who had anything to read, but I did read the article I've written for the newspaper about our trip, and showed photos from the trip. It was just nice getting together, talking with Peggy (not Australia Peggy!), which is always such fun, and getting the story of an adopted dog from Nancy, who had brought photos to show me.

Shortly before we left, a woman came to sit at our table and started talking. She was, she told me, 80 years old and originally from Norway. It was interesting to talk with her (or, more accurately, listen to her), especially when she registered shock at learning how old I am. She thought I was much, much younger. Naturally, I liked her very much!

I found her fascinating, not so much in what she had to say, but in her blunt observations about life, which seemed stereotypically Nordic to me, even though she has lived in this country for more than fifty years.

She has just recently discovered theatre, she told me when someone mentioned that I am a theatre critic. She never had time for it in her life and didn't think she'd like it because she'd rather live life than watch other people go through stereotypical life situations, but a friend has recently been taking her to plays and she's discovered that it's fun. The discussion about theatre led to her telling me about someone she knew who had been involved with theatre and my sharing that our kids had been involved in theatre and that led to that question I hate so much: "How many children do you have?" I usually answer "we raised five children" and hope that they don't have a follow up question, but she did, asking what our kids are doing now. Somehow I managed to steer the answer in the direction of Jeri's work at Berklee and playing for musicals in the Boston area, so I didn't have to explain about Paul and Dave.

Later in the day, we went to Music Circus to see Man of La Mancha. When we go to Music Circus productions, Walt drops me off before he goes to park the car, I get our tickets and sit and wait for him.

Last night, we were driving another critic and a friend of his and so while I sat and waited for Walt to come, he and I were talking. Suddenly someone grabbed me by the elbow and said "Bev Sykes? I thought I recognized your voice!" Then she reminded me of her name and said how good it was to see me. I didn't have a clue who she was and couldn't figure out how I could not recognize her if she knew me well enough to recognize my voice. We talked briefly and she said she was there with her husband and son and that she would have to try to find me at intermission so she could introduce us. I figured she must be someone from our theatre connections here in Davis, so I said that Walt would be there soon and I'd bring him with me. No reaction whatsoever. So this meant that it was someone I knew, but who didn't have a connection with Walt. That let out local theatre connections.

Who in the world was she? And then it hit me who she must be. A woman I worked with for about a year when I was working for The Typing Company. When we left the ticketing area I saw her and her husband and son by the fountain and decided to check out my theory, because if it was the person I thought it was, she didn't know that our old boss died last year. I went up to talk with her again and casually asked what she was doing now. She told me what she was doing and mentioned that she'd done editing for many years before her current job. Bingo. I had correctly identified her. She left The Typing Company to take an editing job, I remembered.

I told her about Ann's death and we talked about that for a bit, and I told her about what Ann's husband was doing now (theatre in Washington state) and we talked about that.

All the while I was talking to her, I was remembering in the back of my mind the tremendous impact she had on my life, which I know she doesn't have a clue about.

I had only been working for The Typing Company for a very short time when my friend Gilbert died. My departure from The Secretariat had been very traumatic. I left not only my job, but my closest friends in town as well. The Typing Company was a very tiny office and I sat in a back corner with my head down and just typed. I hadn't formed any friendships yet. And then Gilbert died.

I was gone from the job for a week or more, while we took care of the business of burying Gilbert and taking care of his family.

When I returned to my job, I was still in the deepest throes of grief. I sat in my little corner and typed, surreptitiously wiping away tears. I had told the others in the office what had happened, but I didn't have the kind of relationship with them (yet) which would make me feel comfortable sharing anything else.

That first day back, the woman I met last night went out to lunch and when she returned, she dropped a little book on my desk. It was "How to Survive the Loss of a Love," a book for people going through grief, whether from the death of a loved one or the breakup of a relationship or even for something as mundane as the loss of a tooth. She told me that she hated to see me in so much pain and told me she thought this little book would help.

I started reading the book as soon as I got home from work and found I could only get to about the second page before I was sobbing. The book became my guidepost through grief. I marked how far I was along in accepting Gilbert's death by how far into the book I could get before I started crying.

It was one of the nicest things a stranger had ever done for me. I wasn't with her long enough last night to remind her of her kindness and let her know what an impact it had on my life. And her name is common enough that there is no way I could ever find her through an internet search. But meeting her again, even briefly, brought it all back and it was so good to see her again.

It was also a reminder that we go through life for the most part unaware whether anything we do really makes a difference. Even though I didn't recognize her face, I have never forgotten this woman and what an effect her small kindness had on me. And she will probably never know it.

Cultivation

Never has the topic of farm subsidies for cultivation produced such gales of laughter, I'm certain! But that's how things were the past couple of days--just silly.

This was my get together with some of the women from the old Women's Health days--one doctor, two nurse practitioners, a midwife, the office manager who hired me, and me. I've seen some of them within the past couple of years, but we haven't been together like this in a very long time. We were missing the 3 nurses, who weren't able to join us, but the group of us who got together on Saturday at Walt's mother's condo at Lake Tahoe made up for the ones who were missing.

First of all, 20 minutes after we arrived, I looked in the heretofore empty refrigerator and found it so full I don't know how we managed to fit even more food in it when Lynne arrived several hours later! I lost count of how many bottles of wine there were for the seven of us (two left after dinner and the rest of us stayed overnight). And countless things to eat from pistachios from Ikeda's, lots of fresh fruit, crackers, cheese, and other things.

But first there were the squeals and hugs of seeing each other again and getting caught up on who is doing what and more importantly how our children had all grown since we last compared notes.

While Lynn made enough tacos to serve a small army for dinner...

...the rest of us were comparing apps for our iPhones and iTouch.

Lynn, who thought my zippo lighter for my iTouch was about the coolest thing ever, ended up downloading the app for herself.

When Lynne arrived from Reno, we had to take group photos.

After dinner, Lynn and Lisa left to return home and the rest of us settled in for the night. There was talk of going to the hot tub or playing a game of some sort, but we were all too stuffed from Lynn's great dinner to seriously consider moving off the couches.

In the morning we had breakfast and three walked down to the lake while RoseMarie and I settled the problems of the world.. Then we put out some of the leftovers to pick at for lunch. (It was a big eating couple of days!)

(I particularly liked the garlic mint flavored cheese!)

Then four of us started loading the car...

...while Mariana finished doing the vacuuming.

It was slow going down the mountain because everybody and his brother was driving back from the lake, but we laughed a lot and tried to figure out how to use the stop and go traffic and the highway construction barricades to allow some of us to relieve our bladders without causing a worse backup.

Now Walt, Lynn and I have had another round of Lynn's tacos and she has gone off to bed. Her visit is ending much too soon, as she is flying to So. California in the morning to visit her family before returning to Houston.

This two day trip was entirely too much fun and we will have to do it again, sooner than 5 years!

An Embarrassment of Riches

The "friends bandwagon" just keeps rolling along.

Lynn arrived from Houston today. It's nice when you are such good friends with someone that you don't feel the need to kill yourself putting on an air of "housewife" but can let the dust lay where it is and not have to apologize for it.

Oh, not that I didn't do anything to get ready for her arrival. I got the sheets on the bed changed, dusted her room, scrubbed the tub, and got clean towels up, but I didn't worry about making the house look spotless. Or even decent. The table was still piled with stuff, the laundry pile towering over me in the laundry room, and the kitchen counter only partially cleaned (and that only because Walt usually does it!) and I forgot to sweep the floor, which is always covered with dog hair and remnants of things the dogs have chewed up.

When it was time, I drove out to the Sacramento airport and waited until Lynn called to let me know she'd picked up her luggage and was waiting outside for me. I love the era of cell phones. How many times I've circled an airport, round and round and round again waiting for someone to come out, or paid for parking for half an hour while I waited in a waiting room. Now I find a nice shady place to park, read my book and wait until the person I'm waiting for calls on the telephone. (In San Francisco, I don't even go near the airport, but wait in the next town over. There's a great parking lot at Kaiser, where there is even a bathroom for patients only--and I'm a Kaiser patient, so feel no qualms about using it!)

It was so great seeing her standing there. The last time I saw her was in 2006, when she was out here for a conference.

We did pretty much the same thing then that we did this afternoon--sat around comparing photos and getting caught up on all the news. And we had lunch with several of the women that we are going to Tahoe with tomorrow.

After she'd settled in here and had been thoroughly inspected by all the dogs, and helped break up a dog fight between Barkley and Sheila (and after Barkley had been "jailed"--put in the cage to separate him from the others for a bit), we took off and went to the grocery store.

Going to a grocery store with Lynn is a real experience because she definitely does not do things by halves. We took two shopping carts, so I could get things for tonight's dinner and she could buy stuff for dinner at Tahoe tomorrow. I had thought it might be easier to put a lasagna together, but she suggested a taco bar and her cart was piled high with every possible thing that you could imagine for such a thing, including both chicken and beef and the right accompaniments for each (there are only going to be seven of us there!) She also bought so much wine that they gave her a free cloth bag with separate bottle compartments to carry it all in.

To look at her cart, you'd think she was doing her week's shopping, not just shopping for an overnight!

We got it all home and then settled in with wine and french bread (and some of that good olive oil I bought in Siena) and visited until Walt got home from the wine tasting he was attending (he usually goes to a wine tasting a week, at the food co-op).

I fixed one of my favorite easy dishes, plum chicken, with gelato for dessert. Lynn mixed up a salad, which gave me the chance to use the salad servers that I bought in Monterosso. (A woman on the tour was going to be leaving and going to Spain, so showed us all her salad tongs that she had gotten in Italy before and said that she loved them and could someone please buy her another set, if they found one. As it turned out we all bought her another set! I decided that I would keep mine instead of giving them to her, since she already had so many others!)

I bought stuff to make pesto lasagna, which I loved when we had it in Portofino, on Sunday night, completely forgetting that our oven still isn't working. I may have to microwave "bake" it and hope that it turns out all right.

But anyway, we ended the day early, since Lynn was on Houston time, and how we just have to get up and be ready to leave for Tahoe at 9 a.m. tomorrow morning. It will be so much fun to see all those women again.

There is no internet access at Walt's mother's cabin so, thought I am taking the computer with me, I won't be able to post an journal entry until I get back on Sunday.

The Friend Meme

Sandwiched in between two meetings with good friends I don't see often enough seems the perfect time to do this short "friend meme," though I discovered that because of cross-over in real life and computer life, it's more difficult than you'd think to answer these questions. The first difficulty is how to separate people who are related by marriage or blood from people who have no connection like that. For that reason, I am automatically NOT considering Walt or the kids, their spouses, my mother or my cousins in answering these questions.

1. Who's your best friend in real life...why?

Now see, this question is difficult to answer because how do you choose among Peggy, who is really more of an online friend now, but with whom I have spent a lot of time and who knows my deepest secrets; Char, who has been a best friend for so long and who also knows my deepest secrets; and Lynn, whom I don't see nearly enough and don't hear from all that often, but who is also a great confidante and knows my deepest secrets. I can't choose from among them, so I'll have to choose all three.

Or should it be a male friend, which would put the choice between Ron and Steve, both of whom have been such an important part of my life but, again, are now more online friends than face to face friends. (But much as I love them, a male friend, even a gay one, isn't quite as fulfilling as a female friend.)

2. Who's your best online friend...why?

This could also be Peggy, since I will probably never see her face to face again, so all that is left is an online friendship, but since I put her in question #1, I should pick someone whom I have never met, or maybe only met once. Again, that leaves me with two people. First would be Bozoette Mary, whom I did meet once in Washington, D.C. and whose blog I have been following forever. Secondly would be Kimberly (aka Indigo), whose daily question site, "That's My Answer" is one that I wouldn't miss every day. I've never met Kimberly, but we have had lots of exchanges about not only questions for TMA, but our respective blogs as well.

3. Who's your most quiet friend...why?

After having spent two weeks with her, and often straining to hear what she says, I would say that my choice for "most quiet friend" would have to be Pat. Not that she is shy and retiring, but only that she is sometimes so soft spoken that you miss what she is saying....and she usually has interesting things to say.

4. Who's your loudest friend...why?

Olivia, whom I met on CompuServe many years ago, who morphed into a face to face friend, but who had the audacity to move to Idaho, where I never see her any more. NOBODY has ever accused Olivia of being soft spoken!!!

5. Who's your oldest friend...why?

No contest here. Char will have to take the prize for being the friend I have continuously known the longest, but my Scrabble buddy, Joan, who is a bit older than Char would have to win for being the oldest in years.

6. Who's your newest friend ..why?

Well, that's a lot easier to answer. I'll go to the recent trip and choose Sheri, whom I met for the first time at the first pre-trip dinner, where I learned that she had been reading my journal for years. How can you not like a person like that? But then I got to know her better during our two week Bataan march and found her a delightful person. I also started reading her blog and keeping up with her, Ashley and Bongo that way.

...and then there is a whole 'nother classification of friends that doesn't really fit into any of these categories...where do I put the CompuServe group, women I've known for more than 10 years, with whom I interact every day, but also with whom I have spent a lot of time over the years, so they don't fit into the strictly "online" friends, but our level of intimacy doesn't quite reach what I have with Peggy, Charlotte or Lynn...yet they are still a very important part of my life and I don't want to leave any of them out either! Pat, Mary, Trisha, Cathy, diane, Sian, DR,...and Bill, our honorary member of this women's group. (I hope I didn't leave anybody out accidentally!) Or the women I'm meeting on Saturday, from the old Women's Health office -- Lynn (already mentioned above), Lynn, Lynne, (yes, there are 3 Lynns) RoseMarie, Mariana, Lisa, Marsha, Dory and Barb. Or the women I still feel close to from the days I worked at The Secretariat -- Melody, Shirley, Cindy (my dentist), and Roberta. Or Diane, who doesn't really fit into any other category, and with whom I used to exchange e-mail several times a week, but who got busy with her grandchildren. Or Jeri, Jeri's godmother, who has been a good friend forever, but now lives in Arizona and has a new love interest, so has been rather scarce lately.

I often bemoan the lack of good friends in my life now, but as I did this meme I realized that the problem is not good friends in my life, it's good friends in this town. When you look at all the people I've listed here and add the close friendships I have with my family and extended family I realize am very fortunate to have so many really good friends. I just wish there were more opportunities to get together like I am doing this week, with two groups of friends to just sit and chat or do the crazy kinds of things Char and I did for years and Peggy and I did both here and in Australia. I miss those sorts of things, but I am more fortunate than many people in having a richness of friends in my life.

Barrack's Bodacious Broads

I don't remember when it started, exactly. Joan and I had been playing Scrabble for awhile, we'd had some e-mail exchanges prompted by some of my journal entries and our growing frustration with George Bush.

One day Nancy suggested we get together for tea or coffee. I think it was just that we were all neighborhood people who never get together and it would be fun to enjoy the sun porch and get caught up.

"Getting caught up" ended up involving a lot of emotional outbursts about things that Bush was doing at the moment and at the end of the morning we'd had such a good time that we decided to do it again.

Nancy is rarely in town, so our get together were few and far between, but over the course of many months we started to call our get togethers our Bush Bashing Breakfasts.

Well, all that ended, of course, in January when the former president slunk out of town, never to be heard from again (oh why couldn't his VP follow suit...?).

We hadn't gotten together since Obama took office, but Nancy was going to be in town and suggested that not only the three of us get together, but that we bring our husbands into it, and we could have a pot luck instead of a daytime coffee.

I had known Joan's husband, Ed, for several years. He's a pilot and teaches flying at the local airport. In the year when I went to the gym faithfully every morning, Ed usually went at the same time and especially whenever Joan was having some sort of health problem we would chat for a bit.

I knew Nancy's husband John was an ophthalmologist, and I had seen him at many events, but I don't know that I had ever actually talked with him before. I don't think Walt had spoken with either of them either.

So Nancy set up a pot luck dinner at her house. And, she said, one of the requirements was that we had to bring three suggestions for what to call our Bush Bashing Breakfast now that GWB was no longer in office (handy that his successor's first name also started with a "B"!)

John cooked some delicious beef, Joan made a fantastic orzo and farfalle salad and delicious cheese-stuffed peppers for hors d'oeuvres, and I made this terrific strawberry dessert.

I was very pleased with how my dessert turned out, after the not-quite-right olive oil cake I had taken to the ACIS dinner last night. This was very simple and very light, just using egg whites, mashed strawberries, lemon juice and sugar, beating the hell out of it until it was very light but thick, then layering it in a bowl with lady fingers and freezing it. It tasted like ice cream, but had no milk in it and, as I said, was very light and refreshing, unlike the olive oil cake which, while it tasted good, was very, very dense.

And we had a delightful time talking about everything from the recent crash of the Air France flight (Ed explained how things work in a cockpit) to the problem with health care in this country (John explained how we got so screwed up and why it's so difficult to fix). We talked about Obama's recent speech to the Muslim world and Cheney's "Honest, I never said that" tour to change history. And we talked about dogs we have all loved and lost. Trips we have taken. Our kids and grandkids.

And we voted on the new name for our group. The three finalists were Bisecting Biden's Buddy, something else and Barrack's Bodacious Babes. We liked the last one, but decided that "Broads" was more "us" than Babes, so our group is now "Barrack's Bodacious Broads." We think it fits perfectly.

It was just a fun, fun evening, the kind we almost never have in this town. I absolutely loved it. Perhaps when we get the urine-soaked carpet out of the living room and things organized, I can start reciprocating a night like this.

---

The only down side of the evening came right before we left, when Walt had a call from his sister saying that their mother had another fall and had fractured her clavacle. Apparently when she first wakes up she is disoriented and she had been napping in her recliner and went to get up, not realizing that her walker wasn't where she expected it to be, and down she went. She wasn't wearing her call button, so lay on the floor until someone came to check on her and found her there.

They rushed her to the emergency room, but when Walt talked with his sister, she was back in her apartment and her caregiver was getting ready to take her to dinner. Her arm is in a sling. She has such a hard time getting around under the best of circumstances that I can imagine that not being able to use her walker is going to add just another layer of frustration (and physical hardship) for her.

For now we're just hanging in there and waiting to see what happens next.

Wasn't It Yesterday When We Were Young?

Last night we drove to Santa Rosa to help our friends Dick and Gerry celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary. I hadn't seen them in over a year, but Walt had dinner with them twice while he was down taking care of his mother and they talked about the anniversary celebration at that time (Gerry had sent me an e-mail about it earlier).

The original plan was to get together with us and with the woman who had been Gerry's maid-of-honor for her wedding (Walt and I were both in the wedding party). But it ended up just being the four of us for dinner.

We met them at their motel and I asked Gerry where we were going to dinner and she mentioned some restaurant in downtown Santa Rosa. As we started looking for the restaurant, I suddenly realized it was all familiar and as we passed the restaurant, I realized that it was so familiar because I had actually eaten in that restaurant when my friend Mary was here visiting from Wisconsin last year. I know one restaurant in the whole city and that's where we were going. I was actually delighted because I remember that it was a great restaurant.

We started with sparkling rose and gave a toast to the anniversary:

(Funny that it's Dick and Gerry's anniversary and the only person who shows in this picture is Walt!)

We went on to have a fantastic dinner. Dick and Walt each had some seafood stuff, Gerry had duck ravioli

and I had butternut ravioli, which I discovered when I read my previous entry about this place, was exactly what I had ordered the last time too. It didn't disappoint the second time around.

It was a lovely dinner, nicely avoiding all the hot button topics that sometimes get us into trouble.

(What's in her hand is their wedding book...
I had one just like it for our wedding)

Then, because we are all crazy for used book stores, we stopped at one which was just across the street and browsed for awhile.

I picked up a couple of coloring books for Pedro. The information about him says that he is interested in art. You can't send an envelope that is more than 1/4" thick, so I found a coloring book with lots and lots of intricate shapes and can send him several pages at once over the coming months. I also found a coloring book about the history of California that I thought he might like as well.

I also found some Albert Payson Terhune books. I collect them--not passionately, but I loved them as a kid and have several. This was not one that I already had, and I recognized a couple of beloved stories in it, so I bought it too.

We finally ended the night by driving back to the hotel and retrieving our car. It was really a lovely evening. But surely it can't have been 45 years since their wedding! Wasn't it only like...yesterday?

Will It Always Be Like This?

The title is from one of Steve's songs and doesn't exactly fit, but it comes darn close.

I think I'm depressed. But I'm not sure. Maybe I'm suffering a backlash which is making me more upbeat than normal.

Awhile ago I wrote a journal entry about my lack of social life. It may seem that with all the SPCA stuff and all the traipsing back and forth to theatrical events that I have a very full social life, but I bemoaned the lack of a buddy in town. I used to have several of them, but for various reasons, we are no longer in touch with one another.

I never posted that entry, for various reasons, and it was probably just as well as I did not.

This week, I've had the opposite problem -- so many social engagements I actually almost forgot one today.

The week has included lunches at various restaurants with three old friends, none of whom I have seen in over two years. There was also tonight's scheduled party, the Cousins Day Christmas dinner tomorrow, and a 2-day get-away with our Pinata group to the Napa Valley while Ashley sits here and puppy sits for us.

Maybe my social life isn't as bleak as I thought it was. But while the increase in social contact is good, it is also somewhat depressing.

First there was Cousins Day, where Kathy hauls her oxygen tank and I bring my blood glucosse monitor and all three of us line up our stack of pills before each meal. (My mother takes ONE vitamin pill. That's it.)

Then reacquainting with these women was on the one hand wonderful, on the other hand depressing. We're all at least two years older. Some are handling the idea of old age better than others. There was talk of stockpiling pills so that when they couldn't take aging and the problems it brings with it any more, there would be pills to ease them out of life.

("Just my luck," said one. "I'd probably put myself in a vegetative state for twenty years and still be aware of what was going on around me, but unable to communicate." That sounds like what would be MY fate if I tried something dumb like that!)

There was a report on one woman's minor back surgery for arthritic deposits, and liver problems and a host of other ailments. I came home from the last lunch so depressed, wondering if this is going to be the rest of my life--sitting around comparing aches and pains with friends and trying to find the most fool-proof, least painful way to off myself!

The mail came and in it was a letter from a doctor in another state. In my present state of mind, the only thing I could think of was that it was someone telling me of the death of my friend Diane (but fortunately it was not)

And then as I started writing this entry I had a call from another woman who had flown in from out of town because she just received word of a friend's death and had come for the funeral. She said it was the third funeral of friends she had attended in the past six months. I knew the friend slightly, but not enough to be informed of her death. She was younger than I am, I believe, and had a massive stroke.

Walt and I were scheduled to go to my editor's Christmas party tonight, which, as I have reported each year, is my favorite event of the year. But I knew that it was more important to get together with my friend, who is alone in a motel tonight and not wanting to be with the bereaved family, so I called Derrick, explained the circumstances, and asked if Walt could come to the party by himself. He was effusive and said of course he could...and that if my friend needed a party atmosphere, to feel free to bring her as well.

My friend invited me to meet her where she is staying so we could go to dinner, but I had to explain that I can't drive because of my eyes, so she would have to come and pick me up.

We had a chance to sit and talk for a very long time and again it was somewhat depressing, though wonderful to see her again.

I don't like this getting old jazz! It's bad enough that your own body starts falling apart, but so do all your friends, assuming they don't die first.

---

Laurel has entered Bri's photo in a contest that can win her $500 toward Bri's college fund. If you feel so inclined, you can vote for her photo here. (I have to admit I was surprised when I couldn't find a way to see the photo full size without going through 1760 pages of other baby pictures, but...whatever. You have to admit it's a cute kid!)