The content of one’s heart

A friend is one to whom one may pour out all the contents of one’s heart, chaff and grain together, knowing that the gentlest of hands will take and sift it, keep what is worth keeping and with a breath of kindness blow the rest away. ~Arab proverb

Friday night we had friends over for dinner. Old friends. Pre-Mayberry friends.

I met my husband James when we worked together on the same magazine. Bugzy and Bob worked with us there, but also before and after in the way that people who write for magazines keep coming up against the same people who write for magazines over and over again.

Bob lives in Southern California. He surfs. He climbs rocks. He volunteers. And he writes—scripts, magazine articles, treatments for reality shows. Bugzy lives in New York. He is a documentary filmmaker and is currently writing a memoir, that will—trust me—be an instant bestseller. He’s got a once in a lifetime story to tell.

To say these guys are larger than life characters doesn’t begin to cover it. Bob is one of the kindest, gentlest souls I know. And Bugzy? Well, Bugzy is Bugzy. He’s Howard Beach meets the Upper West Side with a heart of gold. They are family men. Pied Pipers. Sitting around, talking about old times, laughing, joking, shaking loose our collective memories, I was reminded of a time when I was not the me I have become.

Friday night was a reunion of sorts. James and I haven’t seen Bob in countless years. He looks taller. But the truth is, we’ve all changed. We’ve grown up in ways that defy explanation, to find the true content of our hearts.

 

Ordinary things

Words of wisdom

are so simple

Just look for them

in ordinary things

~The Tao Te Ching: A Zen Poet’s View, by D.R. Streeter

Today marks a year of blogging for me. And it seems somehow appropriate that this first year ended with a real life blogging encounter—not a virtual one. I was lucky enough to spend much of Saturday hanging out in the West Village with Jordan and Kyra.

It was a beautiful day. Blue sky. Warm. Trees topped with pink and green, shadows of white. Spring flowers and vines spilling out of window boxes. The gates to all the pocket parks open wide. I love the Village. NYU. Bleecker Street. The West 4th Street subway stop. There was chemistry in the air. Sparks flying as the conversation turned from beauty treatments to RDI to who does (and doesn’t) do the dishes at home. There is almost no way I have not known these women before.

I don’t know what my expectations were when I started blogging. I do know that I never expected to be so smitten. I’ve met kind and generous people. Shared some amazing stories. Taken comfort in the fact that none of us are alone—unless we truly want to be. I’m a little older, a little wiser, and a whole lot brighter. I’ve learned to appreciate ordinary things and tiny victories and, with the help of so many, how to puzzle out a new approach when the old one fails.

As Kyra rushed off to grab a cab, Jordan and I meandered around Washington Square Park (which is closed for renovations) and then back to the subway—the day winding down, pulling us in opposite directions. Kyra’s taxi took her uptown, Jordan took a train back to Brooklyn, and I was headed home.

Three ordinary friends on an ordinary day coming together, then separating. Finding each other in a truly extraordinary way.

me, Kyra and Jordan

 

What the grownups do

I’m hosting a small dinner party Saturday night. Three couples, plus James and myself. I used to do this sort of thing all the time before our son was born, but as you can imagine, the few get togethers we have now include kids.

There was a long stretch when we simply didn’t entertain. A time when, in fact, we didn’t do much of anything but worry and wonder. Things are different now. We do what we can. Sometimes we do a little more. And sometimes, I even get ambitious, inviting people over to eat and have wine and talk.

So it will be a night for the grownups. Our friends are booking babysitters. I am thinking about—but still undecided on—what to serve. And what to wear. And what sort of mood to set for the evening. Not fussy, but nicer than a family dinner.

I enjoy cooking. But I don’t pay very much attention to recipes. Except for baking. Baking is like chemistry. Cooking is like literature. I’m sure I’m not the first person to have thought of that analogy. It’s fitting, though, don’t you think?

I may browse some food blogs, try to get some menu ideas. Feel free to leave helpful thoughts/recipes in the comments. Meanwhile, I’m going to check out the 27 posts on good eats over at Cindy’s blog, and see what else I can find on the interweb.

I do wish you could come too. Now that would be the ultimate dinner party, don’t you think?

 

As true as ever

Those truly linked don’t need correspondence. When they meet again after many years apart, their friendship is as true as ever. —365 Tao

I’m finding old friends everywhere. And they are leading me to other old friends. Names and faces from another life. Recently, I’ve stumbled upon friends from high school, college, my first real job and every job since. From days and times my brain has trouble rewinding to remember. The internet is the facilitator of all this connecting. Google, classmates dot com, email—the path to the past is littered with links and URLs.

I am no good. I don’t keep in touch. I compartmentalize my life. I close the book on chapters that have played out. I don’t hold on. I let people go. But here’s something: More and more I find myself thinking about the ways in which we are connected. Today I am less interested in closing chapters than I am in seeing the book through to the end.

I want surprises. I want to open myself up to plot twists and cliffhangers. I want to taste my youth and know these old friends again. And I want them to know me. I want to sit outside at a long table on a warm night, drinking wine and eating spaghetti with my past. I want to watch our kids skip laps behind our mismatched chairs, blowing on dandelions, chasing fireflies. I want to gather the tribe, bring everyone together and tell all those remember when tales.

We all let go. We all try to dodge and ditch bits and pieces of our lives. We turn our backs, walk away, but the truth is, just because we let something go, doesn’t mean it’s gone. Sometimes we are lucky enough to find that it’s right here, waiting, exactly where we left it.

Sometimes what they say is true. Sometimes what we’re looking for are the things we’ve always had.

 

In the company of friends

I’ve often written about how insular and provincial our town can be. There are times when I feel squeezed by the smallness of living in Mayberry and yet, there are times when this community lifts me up and holds me in a warm embrace.

Last night was a lift me up kind of night. My best neighborhood friend was having a few couples over to celebrate her 40th birthday. This particular group of friends is pretty close-knit. All of us have kids the same age, involved in the same activities and attending the same schools.

When our son was struggling in preschool, many of these same families were witness to the chaos. I didn’t know them well back then. I was so overwhelmed by how our own lives were spiraling out of control, I couldn’t look people in the eye, couldn’t reach out or make connections. I was convinced we were alone, left to muddle through all the things we didn’t know with no one but ourselves to lean on.

But I was wrong. Little by little, people began to reach out to us, to pull us in. And though I tried to find reasons not to trust them, to believe they were only being nice, they persevered. They began to include us. In the four years that we’ve lived in this town, we’ve been blessed by this group of friends.

Last night, as I chatted about books and movies and recipes for baked brie, I had to smile. The birthday girl is an amazing hostess. She and her husband have a knack for bringing people together, for making sure everyone has a place, a spot to stand or sit with food and drink in hand.

And though I talked a bit about my son, shared stories with the other moms, it wasn’t about him or autism or therapy or what we were or weren’t doing right. It was simply a night out. An evening with friends. A chance to connect.

It wasn’t my birthday we were celebrating, but for a few hours last night, I felt like I was the one with all the gifts.