Timeless Friendships

My favorite kind of days are when I wake up at one old friend’s house and drive to an even older friends house. My darling friend David flew home today from Ghana just in time to see me at breakfast before I departed his and John’s house. I would have loved to have had more time with David, but after his flying all night and my need to get on the road I had to go.

Driving north on I -95 was a very familiar thing for me to do. Covid is still having some affect on traffic in a positive way, until I hit Connecticut. Then it was just one Range Rover after another jockeying for a one car advantage and putting all the rest of us at risk. But they do own the road.

I got to my friend Nancy’s house before either she or her husband Peter were back from their haircuts. I really love friends who step up their personal grooming just in time for my visit. I am sensing a theme here as I cut John’s hair yesterday at his house and now Nancy and Peter.

I got a chance to spend time with their wonderful daughter Sarah who is about to go to grad school. I love talking with my oldest friend’s grown children because you see so many qualities repeated in their offspring. I knew that when I met Nancy when we were both fifteen that I would be friends with her for life. Then when she introduced me to Peter before they got married and he had a sticker in the back window of his car that just said, “college” I knew he had the kind of sense of humor that was well above most.

Nancy and Peter, of newly coifed hair, came home and we got a good gab on while Nancy slaved away cooking us a Spanish extravaganza of tomato bread, cheese, paella and salad. My friends I impose on to visit during my drive really go all out cooking for me and I really appreciate it. Considering Covid, going out to eat holds no joy, but sitting outside on a beautiful cool Connecticut summer night with friends is glorious.

After dinner we went inside and on Nancy’s coffee table was an unopened game that I had just read about YESTERDAY, as the best game ever made. It is called Wingspan. So we decided to play it. There is nothing I like better than a whole family of game players.

Nancy started unpacking the box of small colored eggs, 170 game cards with birds, little tokens, game boards, a birdhouse you have to build and hundreds of other small bits and bobs. There were two instruction manuals and an appendix. She started reading. It was way too confusing. Then she saw you could watch a video to learn how to play. We opted for that and crowded around her computer for the fifteen minute video, pausing at every instruction to set things up. After watching the whole thing none of us actually had any idea what the object of the game was and what we were to do with half of the bits and bobs, but we started anyway.

One thing we did know was it took four rounds to play a whole game. We barley got through one round in over an hour of actual play. Sarah beat us all, with Nancy coming it a close second, followed by Peter and I was dead last. I am not sure who wrote the article about Wingspan being the best game ever, but I think it definitely needs to be played a few hundred times before you understand all the options of the game.

Nonetheless, it was one of the most fun evenings I have had all year. Forty-five years of friendship is just a timeless thing. Breaking up my driving by going from one friend to another is the best. Thankfully they welcome me every time.