99% of Texans

Visiting our friend Julie, whom we all call July, yesterday Warren, July and I talked about the last time we were all together in Maine during the winter of 1984. The one missing piece from that trip was our fourth, Shannon. Shannon was July’s roommate at walkers and was as opposite from July as anyone could be as a fast talking girl from Fort Worth, Texas.  
Shannon was very self assured and in the preppy world of New England she held tight to her southwestern wear. While I was wearing grosgrain ribbon belts with big frog buckles on my straight leg Levi’s, Shannon wore a beaded belt with her name in seed indian beads across the back holding up her boot cut jeans.
I used to ask her about the popularity of those bead belts with tooled leather and silver buckles. In her strong southern accent Shannon would say, “99.99% of people in Texas wear Shannon belts,” almost faster than a normal human could understand. I used to tease her that everyone must be named Shannon.
While July, Warren and I walked back to her office yesterday I repeated Shannon’s mantra in my best Texas drawl. After a big laugh, I asked July if she had Shannon’s number since I had not been in contact with her in 35 years either. She did not, but we vowed to try and find her and have a reunion.
Last night after Warren and I had our dinner on the front porch of Clam Cove as the evening sky gave way to darkness I pulled out my phone and began my google search for Shannon. In a mere four or five clicks I found a landline and despite the late hour Warren and I called it. Miraculously Shannon answered in her familiar southern drawl and I told her that I was Dana Carter. Her reaction was as if she had been sitting in Fort Worth waiting for me to call this very night.
We covered all the regular info and set a date for a reunion for the four of us next summer. We told her to look at the blog to see a picture of us with July. We hung up the phone thrilled how quickly we had reconnected. In a moment my phone buzzed a message from my blog. This is what it read;
“How wonderful to hear from you and to see this blog! July looks exactly the same and so do you and Warren. Love the quilt as the backdrop. Can’t wait to reconnect now and looking forward to a real reunion next summer!

What a great Friday night!

Love, Shannon

P.S. 99% of the people in Texas wear Shannon belts!”
Really great friends never forget!