Celebrating Friendship & Love

New Year's Eve...2006 Harry and I went to dinner with old, old friends and we were home by 9 PM. Daughter Honey is out partying and Son Brian decided to stay home and clean. (I just got up and toppled a bowl of cat food. It's a tiny room filled with cat toys, bowls of food and water, kitty litter and human electronic detritus.) There were events Harry and I could have gone to, but nothing personal that drew us, and that matters to me.
For a couple of years, we went to a our friend Rocco's for dinner very often, but slowly that deteriorated into ugly cliques and discomfort. After I got sick in August and we stopped going, the group forgot about us. Those kind of friends are acquaintances, people who are friendly when you see them. Like work friends.
I sound bitter to myself and I wish that were not so. When relationships click, you know it. I knew those people were not my friends. They posed for me, invited me to their parties, and we liked each other. But that's not enough for a friendship. From that group, Joalice and Barry became my friends and for that, I'm thankful. I don't meet my kind of people often.
I don't see my friends often enough, don't call enough, don't make enough effort. I hang in the house too much, don't feel like talking. Tomorrow, New Year's Day, I'm going to a concert, probably by myself. If I'd thought it through, I could have stopped out to see Theresa; she lives nearby. But I'm relatively satisfied I'm intending to carry through on my own. For many years, I've watched concerts come and go wishing I'd been there. Harry wasn't interested so I retreated to the sofa. In order to catapult me from my shell, I needed an incentive like a salary or more information about Lupus, which I feared would kill me. Otherwise, my car keys stayed in my handbag.
No wonder Brian decided to stay home and clean. Thank God Honey goes to parties. I guess I'd need intravenous Paxil or a lobotomy. I have no idea what "normal" is, whether how I feel is it; or if I'm an example of genetics gone down the tube. I'll never know because the people I cherish are just like me.
So here's to Nancy; Susan; Theresa; Joalice; Cousin Jerry; my brother Bruce; Harry; and my wonderful children Honey and Brian. I've probably left out somebody who I love dearly; just say it's the Lupus and it probably is anyway. Meanwhile, it's 2006 and I hear, but can't see the fireworks. (That's another thing I love but never make the effort to see. And the Mummers--in Philly, we have a great New Year's parade with string bands and they're wonderful.)
2006. Honestly, when I was a kid, I couldn't believe I'd live to see the new millennium. Being in my fifties looked then like a very old age. Of course now I feel terrific though middle-aged and wiser. And more tolerant...of the noisemakers and people yelling at them just outside my window. Sometimes life is humorous.