A Reflection On Tonight

I visited an old friend and her new husband (who is older than she). What a present! It had been a couple of years since last our matched presence.

I drove along I-80 into New Jersey, a route familiar to me as I wended through the same highways when I was wee up to my grandmother's home on Cedar Lane in Halifax, Massachusetts.

The darkened road conjured ghosts of goats and imagined mist beasts from my childhood, some three decades past. Mostly, me listening to The Cure's The Head On The Door on cassette or a mix or three. In those days to MA, we'd cross the Tappan Zee and decide on which of five McDonald's to visit for a mid-drive garbage meal, knowing the Rhode Island rest area after the Big Blue Bug would likely cease to be open.

This time, the voyage was solo and shorter: I drove some 24 miles beyond the NJ border. The Jordan Harbinger podcast wound down before the end of my sojourn on the road, so I tuned in to local radio murmur. Pop pablum, country quaff condolences, R&B rap romances, indie indulgences, rock ramblings, gospel grovels...

I arrived at the end of a comfortable drive alive and guessing at parking amidst garage door aisles with no front door markings. My friend called to confirm my health and location; I was beckoned inside.

We convened and ordered Korean and Japanese. I translated some menu items that the local shop failed to explicate. I still do not know what the "Heart Attack" entails, but another time...

We three consumed the hours, ensuing massive amounts of shared care and doings until adult sleeplessness made its necessity known. Had coffee been brewing, endless talks from dusk to dawn would have been pursued. Love within three.

One of the cats greeted my friends and me. He basked in the new friend's aplomb to have this hobbit to give pets. Those neck nuzzles and rubs... Heaven. Driving and yawning, I spent an hour going back to my temporary residence. A state border toll had me searching my vehicle for change. Pulling over, I found the coinage to pass the border. I drove to my loving refuge. That is a portion of my mind's recollection. Whatevsies.