Tag: friends

Experience

He was seventy-five, and she, the younger, was just seventy-three. They met on a cruise to Alaska, an adventure to eat food and see things like glaciers. They knew they didn’t agree on politics but there was e l e c t r i c i t y between them, not sparks or embers, but record one hundred mile long billion volt lightning strokes. So they said, what the hell, let’s try this and see.

Adventurous people they were, they went ‘camping’ together, renting a small cabin to share (there were separate beds), fishing and hiking in the day, campfires and singing at night.

Ten days in, they knew it would not work. He was an ardent Trump supporter and she was advocating RESIST. She gave him three choices: “Take me to an airport and I’ll fly home. Drive me home. Drive me to somewhere where I can rent a car and I’ll drive myself home.”

He replied, “Number three sounds good.”

So that’s what they did, swearing never to see one another again, and unfriending one another on Facebook.

It was a thirty-day life experience.

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Ragged Dream

Leaving a business conference. Get in my car to drive away. My wife is with me and my car is a silver sports car. I start driving down the road when I notice someone not in their lane off my right rear quarter panel. Concerned they’ll hit me, I accelerate and move to the left. The road is rough and bumpy, with many cracks and potholes, but eventually, with some drama, I get clear of the other car, a large silver SUV.

We come upon a little truck stop. We’re to pause there to meet up with others. They’re already there, including several friends from my life. We purchase food and coffee. Some of my co-workers are there. We gather around a guy who’s explaining what we need to do to collect expenses and be reimbursed. A co-worker asks for an expense slip. I realize I need the same and request it. I’m also given some additional travel money. Pleased, I go off to join my friends.

I’m ready to hit the road; they’re not. I try to complete paperwork but realize a few things are missing so I can’t complete it. Then I worry about my car from something I see through the truck stop window. I go out and check on the car and find it’s fine. Back inside, I hang around a cashier counter, idling at racks of food, map and magazines, waiting for my friends. They come out. “Ready to go?” I ask.

“No, not yet, just a little while longer,” one female friend answers. “I want another cup of coffee.”

“Ten minutes?” I reply.

“No, twenty.”

I accept that but I’m not happy. Returning to the counter, I press a button on a small device and discover I’ve inadvertently purchased three lottery tickers. The smarmy, greasy, toothless cashier demands payment, and I fork over ten dollars. Inexplicably, I return to the device. I think I’m doing something else and hit the button to buy lottery tickets again. I’m so exasperated. The same cashier demands payment, and I do it. And then, I hit the same button one more time.

This time, I can’t find the money to pay him. I thought I had more money. The cashier crows, “Then I’m just going to have to take these lottery tickets back. No money, no tickets. That’s how it’s played.”

His attitude annoys me but I’m more annoyed that I don’t have the money I thought I did. And people around me now think I don’t have money, and that bothers me. Going through my wads of papers I’m holding, though, I uncovered a fifty dollar bill. “There,” I say, trying to show it to others. “I do have money.”

The end.

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Not Always Quick

I’m not always a quick thinker. Otherwise, I would have answers today.

It’s about a dream. Yeah. I should have asked myself, why are you dreaming this? I don’t recall ever featuring pigs in a dream before.

I was feeding a pig. He was a shiny little pink porker. He came downstairs in my house, a very happy and excited little creature. I had company. Friends were visiting. I didn’t want the pig downstairs. So I called him and led him back upstairs.

It was messy upstairs. It seems like we were in a transition. My intention was to feed the pig some cornflakes. He found some on the floor and gobbled them up, but he wanted more. I thought he spotted more but they  turned out to be scraps of paper. He didn’t want to eat those. As I searched for corn flakes to feed him, another pig, slightly larger but equally pink and shiny, emerged, along with a few cats. So I talked to them, telling them I was looking for food and was going to feed them, even as I couldn’t find the food that I expected. I headed downstairs to find some.

I had company, three former co-workers from a flying unit. Laying on sofas, they were watching television and playing games while they chatted to me and my wife. I was annoyed because they had disconnected the best television and were employing old cathode ray televisions on carts. I set about fixing that.

Meanwhile, another friend from the same unit showed up. I asked him what he thought of his new position. He replied, “This is what war sounds like.” Then, using a gallon paint can, he made a metallic rumbling noise that was loud and unpleasant. “All the time,” he said.

Others, less known but known, showed up. Setting up tables, they sat down to prepare food to feed me. I was embarrassed and grateful for their efforts, but I kept trying to tell them that it wasn’t necessary. They ignored me, continuing to cook.

Pigs…confusion…identity. It’s something to research and think about today, since I didn’t bother to ask myself for clarification when it was happening. I’ll need to think quicker next time.

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M.A.D.

Yep, M.A.D.: More Awesome Dreams.

The dream waves continued last night. All the remembered dreams were about going on picnics. Thinking about this, I laughed: this is all a picnic. What a ‘tude.

So the three dreams were about going on picnics. Each had wonderful weather and different settings. I was an adult in each but in different stages of life. In dream number one, I was youngest and my picnic companions were mostly family, augmented with friends. The second dream featured military members (although none were in uniform – I just ‘knew’ they were military members), while the third dream was community. Again, it was a surprise and a laugh to think, interesting, I’m going on picnics with three pillars of my existence in family, military and community. Although I knew in the dream this is what these were, nobody from any of those areas of my life were actually there. That is, Mom was there but it wasn’t my Mom from life.

All the dreams shared a very joyful, flirtatious, happy and energetic atmosphere. The picnics were planned and now were being executed with small details gone awry. For instance, in the first picnic (with the family), there was confusion about my food and the proportions, but I was working it out. In the third dream, the ‘community’ dream, a young female stranger sought me out as we were preparing to leave. She had a computer issue and couldn’t open a file with a certain application, and was asking for my help.

I won’t subject anyone to further details. They were cool dreams and I awoke feeling uplifted, rested and energized. I laugh just remembering them. I give them four point five stars on my scale of one to five.

After all, they weren’t perfect.

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Three Best

Yesterday was my 60th birthday. I lack the socialization or genes or spirit to celebrate. I just don’t do it, not for holidays, nor my birthday. I will try to celebrate with others but when my spouse asks me what I want to do for my birthday, or what I want, I’m pretty lost about my answer.

And I think it’s been so for a long time. But in thinking about what to do, I reflected on the best birthday celebrations. Three stand out in mind. So in no order, because they are the three best —

My fifteenth birthday. I’d moved in with my father and was living in an apartment by the military installation where he was assigned, in Dayton, Ohio, just him and me. I spent days by myself, which isn’t a bad life for me, as I was active as an artist and created pencil drawings, and I read books. My one friend outside of this was my Dad’s friend, Jim. Jim picked me up once a week to take me fishing. After a few weeks of that, he asked me if I wanted to go home with him for lunch. I did, and ended up meeting my future wife.

The birthday tie-in comes from spending July 4th with her and the rest of Jim’s family. Discovering it was my birthday the next day, my fourteen year old future wife ‘borrowed’ my watch and refused to give it back to me, until midnight struck. Then she presented it to me as a gift. That was a great birthday.

But another great birthday involved my Mom. She asked me what I wanted to do and we ended up going to a steak house, like I was an adult, where I had a New York strip steak. I think it was my first steak and certainly the first time I felt like I was more than a son with my mother, but also a friend. That was a great birthday.

The third came when I was stationed in Germany with the Air Force. I flew to the US to go to a writing conference in Ohio. Since I was in that region of the world, with all the time and expense associated with getting there, I also visited my Mom and sisters in Pittsburgh, PA. Going out of their way, they procured me Penn Pils beer, which was like German beer that was brewed in Pittsburgh, and made my favorite dishes. It wasn’t my birthday but it was in the same time period, and, as I’d left home long before and was rarely back, they treated my visit like a birthday celebration. That was a great birthday.

Like many things in life, I’ve been extremely fortunate. Remembering them, and having all the shout-outs from friends, acquaintances, companions, relatives and former co-workers via the Internet (and an enjoyable day with my wife, who I met forty-five years ago) has made this birthday a wonderful day.

Thanks for a great birthday.

I guess that’s four.

 

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