The phone rang at 1:30 p.m.
“So what are you doing?” my best friend asked.
“Working, but I’ll meet you for lunch.”
“How about a drink instead?”
“Well I need to touch base with a few reporters in Chicago this afternoon, so why don’t I meet you at 4:00?”
“Ok”
*click*
My best friend moved back to DC a few months ago. She’s the sister I never had. We lived together as roommates for almost four years with our brothers, at one point or another, crashing on air mattresses on the floor or on the sleeper-sofa for months at a time.
This afternoon, we met at a shi-shi new bar for a martini supper. And talked about… the glory days. For hours.
I mean, we discussed the new job she’s starting next week, and that her parents’ cat died this past weekend (don’t ask), and the guys we’re each interested in.
But the night was devoted to stories. About the man on the street we begged to carry two kegs to our third story apartment because we hadn’t considered how heavy they’d be. We paid him with beer. And the time her brother’s friend crushed Advil on the gross coffee table and snorted the powder for fun. The martinis we drank poolside in Puerto Rico, and the guys we met in Montreal three years later. The time we cooked dinner for an Irishman (her date) and an Englishman (my date), and how our one request was ‘bring bread’ and their reply was ‘WonderBread.’
As I walked home in the 100 degree heat, I thought, “how odd – our conversation, almost the entire four hour conversation, was based in the past. Is this it? Am I doomed to relive the glory days because my present is too stable and boring to talk about? Have I inadvertantly turned into Al Bundy? Are all my stories now based in what has already happened?”
So now I’m feeling bummed and motivated to make new stories. Because the old stories are so… yesterday. And the thought of going over those past episodes one more time is depressing. It makes me feel really, really old.
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