Long lost pals

Interesting weekend. I caught up with no less than 4 people that I haven't talked to in some time.

On Friday, my friend R. called. He was in New York, on his way to Ft. Lauderdale to catch the last leg of his cruise to Seattle. This last part was a spur of the moment decision. He took 5-ish months off to do a cruise around the world, and was originally going to fly back home, but then decided to just cruise all the way back. This adds about another 18 days to his trip, and will allow him to see several ports in Mexico, which think is highly worth it. He called about a month ago from goodness knows where and left a message to say hi, since I wasn't able to answer when he called. I'm looking forward to his return, since we always go to see really cool movies when he's in town. It sounds like he'll be staying with his parents briefly before heading back to Pennsylvania and work.

On Saturday, my friend C. called. He's actually the reason that I'm in the computer industry now. After graduating from college with my humanities degree, he asked what I was going to do with my life. I had abandoned the idea of doing law school, since the thought of another several years in school made me want to bang my head against a wall. So, I answered that I'd probably go into teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) students, as that was what I was currently doing as a tutor. He suggested that I go into software testing, to which I laughed as I knew little more than how to turn on a computer and type my term papers. But, he convinced me to try and after a few years of software testing, I made my way into technical writing, and viola! A star was born. Anyhoo, C. is now living in Chicago and does a super secret job. He's one of the smartest guys I've ever known - one of those people you just look at and wonder how they can be that brilliant. Graduated early, and got several degrees, etc. Cool guy.

That afternoon, L. and I headed over to visit my friend, E. who is in the middle of a bathroom remodel following his divorce. We went to a tile store downtown and found a really good option. I'm helping out with the decorative side of things, while he worries about the stuff like subflooring and drywall. We then headed to his watering hole, where we drank some beers and played Scrabble. I won.

Tonight, my friend M. called, but I wasn't able to pick up. So, he just left a message. I'll have to give him a call back tomorrow and see what he's up to. It's been a few months since we last chatted.

Anyway, I think it's really interesting that out of all of the friends I've had in my life, it's my guy friends that are the best about keeping in touch with me. Everyone talks about how good girls are at doing such things, but I have to say that in my experience, it's my guy friends who are better at reciprocating with communication. I only occasionally hear from any of my high school girl friends. And by occasionally, I mean like once every few years or something. But, all of these guys this weekend are guys that I've known at least 11 years or more - in the case of R., he was my 7th grade boyfriend and first kiss, so we go waaaayyyy back. And my friend, エリック, went to Japan for over two years, and we kept in touch the whole time. So, I'm very glad that I have such good friends. It's nice to hold on to people who knew you way back when :)