Reunions

I'm going to make use of my poetic license (acquired along with my first Master's Degree--in Poetry, SF State, 1983) and give you a collection of thoughts. See what the combination evokes for you.

A phone call

It came a week and a half ago. We have caller ID, so I could read his name on the display. It seemed improbable to me that a cousin I barely knew and hadn't spoken to in 40 years would be calling out of the blue, but who else could it be? I decided to pick up.

A deep voice asked if I was me. And, if I was who I used to be. I asked, "Are you my cousin?" He agreed that he was. We proceeded to talk for the next 10 minutes about ourselves. He had called my brother earlier that day, and that's how he'd gotten my married name and phone number. He said it had been a long time since he had spoken to us, and he didn't want it to go on any longer.

The funny thing is that, when we were kids, we barely knew each other. I have probably seen him less than five times in my life. His mother was my dad's sister, and my dad didn't try to see his family often. It's hard to make any sense of those old complex feelings now, but it's also not easy to feel strong pulls of family bond at this late date. In their place, I feel a simple openness.

A tent at Maker Faire

I noticed, while walking past, an open-air tent where leaders were teaching eager people how to solder. Adults, kids, men, women, boys, girls, all bent themselves over small objects of metal they were joining together with a metal alloy. This was a very popular activity. There were only a few empty seats.

Joans

On Monday, I will be getting together with another Joan, a Joan from my past. When I was in college (before I got my poetic license), I had a roommate named Joan. We Joans had a third roommate, a woman named Shari. Shari now lives 2 blocks down the street from me, here in Berkeley.

The other Joan had been "lost" to us, living all this time, it seems, in Vancouver, Washington. Shari and I just "found" her--or, rather, she found us--thanks to Facebook.

Shari is making a big brunch for us, offering for my opinion, this list of tasty options:

• Fruit Salad
• Lox, bagels, cream cheese, cucumber
• Blintzes
• White Fish Salad (maybe)
• Frittata
• OJ
• Coffee/Tea/Milk

I'll note that blintzes are Shari's specialty, and that I'd been hoping she would make them! I've been imagining our old threesome, which featured funny, articulate, and deep discussions that carried us hither and yon to the tune of old Simon and Garfunkle, Jethro Tull, and Randy Newman albums. Admittedly, we won't be, as we once were, magic-enabled, but still, I figured we have something like 33 years of catching up to do. We could just hit the high points, and it would get pretty high all by itself.

However, in the last few days, as we've been getting closer and Shari has made attempts to nail down dates and times, it's become clear that our long lost Joan has decided to bring her husband and her sister to this brunch, which suggests she has a very different idea about this brunch get-together than I had had. Ah well, time, as they say, has gone by.

Concluding couplet

I can't resist leaving you with this:

We like putting things together
Do we like putting things together?