my life 2007

Makes me think of a Brian Adams song.

I was supposed to go to the Mid-Winter Social with my department. It was going to cost me $38 for the meal alone, and I would dress up (me?!) and go dine like I had some polish at a swank restaurant Saturday night with everyone else I work with, and their spouses, as appropriate. I quite like the people I work with. I wasn't happy about the entrance fee, but you can't have everything.

Then I randomly decided to check my hotmail account Tuesday evening, as I sat sweating and shivering, etc. I've had this email account almost as long as I've been on the internet. At some point, I developed problems checking it, with certain software (IE seems to burp with it on my computer, for reasons unknown), so I moved on. Besides...I had a Gmail account (actually, two) that I used regularly and liked much better.

But ANYWAY. I found an email from Phil.

Phil is a friend of mine from long ago and far away when I was an undergraduate college student and spending my summers in Belgium. He's in the British Army (Her Majesty's Royal Army?) and was stationed at SHAPE* then. We spent two or three summers bumming around together and have kept in touch--better here, hit and miss there...you know.

* Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe. Or, as we used to say, Super Holidays At Public Expense.

Phil invited me to his wedding (coming up this summer) almost two years ago. I said youbetcha, I'll be there. Plenty of time to sock away money for the trip and plenty of time to ensure I can take leave: no excuses. (So then the whole RIF thing comes up, right...? :roll:)

Well. He'd sent me an email asking for my snail mail address so he could send me a proper wedding invite. I responded with info, although he probably asked me for that in November or something--that's just how rarely I check that account. I actually had the presence of mind to ask him, in my response, to reply to my Gmail account instead, as it's the one I normally check.

Well, whaddaya know. He responded and happened to mention he was in Florida doing some flight training. I asked if he could possibly shoot up here for the weekend; he--quite reasonably--asked if I'd have time for him if he did. I said, "For you, I'd make time." He came back shortly with, "I'll be there. Stand by for details."

w00t! So he shows up around 7pm Friday because his original plane caught on fire or something, and we retire to my basement where we engage in two national British pasttimes until the wee hours (drinking lager and playing darts). And in fits and spurts, we relive the Summer of '99.

I'd just graduated from college at Hurricane Central (University of North Carolina at Wilmington) and I went to Belgium for 90 days to visit a friend (Barbara) on passport. I'd met Phil on a previous visit (two?), and quite enjoyed his company. It turns out that an old friend moved in across from him in the dorm shortly after I arrived: John Ingles. Phil is Welsh. John is Scottish. Both are (were?) in the British army at the time. The four of us made a comfortable and entertained foursome whither we went...and we went lots of different places. We went to Amsterdam (of course!) and made a memorable run to Normandy. We did a canoe trip in Belgium. Phil gave me a primer in SCUBA diving and put an honest effort into teaching me to climb.*

* Both are unnatural acts, incidentally. When you SCUBA, you must learn to breathe underwater. When you climb (assuming with a partner), you must learn to push away from the rock face when you slip. Yeah. Try either.

Mostly, though, we had "barbeques" at Barb's place--a countrified Belgium farmhouse with a fishpond, near nothing in particular. We cooked steaks and watched movies. We went to bars. We went to the waterpark in Brussels. We were always doing something, the four of us.

Until that summer, I didn't truly understand the nostalgia of Brian Adams' "Summer of '69," and no one could have explained it to me. It's one of those things you can understand superficially, until you've had your own. The summer of '99 was our summer. We were inseparable, and would go anywhere, try anything.

We still talk as easily as we did then. You know how you can tell a real friendship from a Friendship of Place, Time, or Convenience? That's how. When you meet again, do you have things to say to one another? Or do you talk a bit and...that's it? We talked all weekend and were still talking when I took him back to the airport.

In early July, he will marry Leigh, the woman to whom he's been engaged since 2005. She's 4'7"--truly a "wee Irish lass." I can't wait to meet her. They're tying the knot in a "proper church" (Anglican, I reckon) with a proper choir in his home town (parish?). There will be a huge party. It will be the last day of his enlisted service, and it's a military wedding. Thus, I needn't invest in any fancy clothes; he's insisting I come in uniform. No problem.

Then, I thought I'd take a week to hang out and see the sights in London and environs. I've been there before, but not exactly on my own reconnaisance.

This will be a terrific summer. But I think I'll buy the tickets NOW.

d