This One’s for You, TP!

I feel a little guilty that I haven’t written for several months, a fact the Facebook keeps reminding me of almost weekly. It was easy to ignore it the first 50 times, but the last 100 or so have been slowly piling on the guilt. I would say that it is almost like Facebook is nagging me, but I refuse to personify social media, no matter how many times Facebook acts like it knows me by “intuitively” placing ads on my feed based on my recent browsing history. Honestly, it’s just downright creepy.

As much as I appreciate the faithful finger-pointing by my social media, it was not enough to get my creative blogging juices flowing again. I would occasionally run across something that was “blog-worthy”, but then the inspiration fizzled out as quickly as it came. Busyness & fatigue – my ever-constant companions – were not helping the matter, either.

So what finally got me off my proverbial pot & got me going on writing again?

I had the opportunity (& truly, the honor) of celebrating a longtime friend’s birthday & retirement after 37 years serving in the National Guard. What an awesome weekend! Filled with a baseball game, a party, and friends we haven’t seen in an age… general merriment and mayhem abounded. And, to top it all off, it was Bearded-Hat Night at the baseball game! Nothing screams elegance and style more than a piece of grey fur buttoned onto a stocking cap. Always looking to elevate our appearance, we proudly wore our caps for most of the evening (although I admit I wasn’t brave enough to keep the fur on).

We spent the two weeks prior trying to come up with a fun way to commemorate the events. What would set the right tone? Express our heartfelt appreciation and yet maintain a sense of dignity fitting for these momentous occasions? After much heated discussion, we settled on kazoos and full medieval regalia, complete with a crown, cape, & chalice. My hubs was able to dust off his announcer voice and deliver a heartfelt speech.

Our friend, ever the good sport, wore his crown & cape & drank out of his chalice for the rest of the evening. The game was slow, but conversation was not. Selfies, photobombs, popcorn-throwing, and dancing during breaks so we could maybe be caught on camera was all part of the fun. Truly a great night out! Absolutely worth the $30 we spent on parking & the $10 we spent on two bottles of water.

The next evening was the retirement party and we met with even more friends. It confirmed what I already suspected. My daughter has a far more interesting life than we do. Work, kids, and homeschooling…that’s all that we have to share with people and, because we choose to spare them the nitty-gritty details of our daily humdrum (hey, we got a great deal on Almond Milk at Fred Meyers the other day!), our contribution to any conversation would last all of 5 minutes if it weren’t for the exploits of our kids. Thankfully, our daughter’s two trips out of the country & being close to graduation makes our lives sound much more exciting, if only by association. Shout-out to the daughter for being cooler than her parents and thus not forcing us to resort to sharing about our physical ailments in order to keep the conversation going.

What stood out most of all was reading through the program from our friend’s retirement ceremony. I have heard him share things about his job over the years, but it barely scratched the surface of all that he has done…medals & honors he was awarded with…how many lives he has impacted. I’ve only ever known him in his civilian life – a fun-loving, loyal friend who always tells great stories and remembers to ask about the small details of our lives. It was a very eye-opening to read about his “other life”. All I can say is thank you, TP, for your service.

It is because of him that I finally got myself in gear & started writing this post. His simple question asking about why I haven’t written in a while achieved what FB tried but could not – motivation! So I (& you, hopefully) can thank him for that, too.