I stayed in tonight to catch up on some work before my sister gets here in ONE WEEK and I go to Albany/NYC in TWO WEEKS for spring break. And before I start an Italian take home test (rockin' Saturday night, this) I took a break to look at some pretty amazing mail: The Flash Drive.
This deserves an explanation. Almost two years ago, one of my friends from my hometown got a free flash drive, and decided that we should mail it to each other, like those girls do with jeans in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. (If you don't know it, TSofTP is a series of books about four friends who are separated during the summers during high school, so they send a pair of pants back and forth to each other.) So we've been doing the same with the flash drive. There are also four of us, in slightly different places--the art teacher-bartender in New Paltz, the early childhood-toddler educator in Jamestown, the Republican Senator staff assistant in Erie (and yes, we have an unspoken pact to not talk politics around each other--this is what you get for being friends with someone since the age of five, before either of you have formed political opinions..), and me.
So we mail the flash drive to each other, usually in the same order, and each time add music, recipes to the recipe file, and a letter to the person you're sending it to. We don't talk as much on a regular basis as we used to when we all lived in the same place, and certainly less than I talk to my college friends, who I'm in fairly frequent contact with. So this process is a really lovely way to keep track of day to day things--the letters are usually about the weather, how work was that day, and general things that are going on. You delete your past letter before you send it on--in looking at mine, it was written right before I moved to Indiana, so that was a reminder of how nervous I was. And included this, "Just counted and I've packed 22 scarves. Absurd. But at least I should I should look the art historian part, right? Come visit and we can drive to Kentucky!!"
Included in the envelope with the flash drive is usually random papers, CDs, and last time, a sweet Pirates of the Caribbean nightlight, which is in use in my bathroom. This time my friend has included a drawing she did of the four of us from a photo that we took after winning at bar trivia a few summers ago. I will probably keep it and substitute a drawing of my own. Last time I think I stuck in an article about Van Gogh that I had cut out of the Smithsonian, because they all took French in high school. There are no rules for this thing, and that's the best part.
The recipe folder gets better every time--I've made the beer bread, quiche (cheap and filling, excellent) and the red pepper-tortellini soup, and am excited to try the Spinach-Artichoke pizza this week, and the lemon bars sometime in the near future. The music represents us all really well, too. I love receiving mix tapes and CDs but am terrible at compiling them, as I never have "new" music to add--my main contributions have been Regina Spektor, a smattering of songs from the late 60s-early 70s (The Doors/The Supremes/CCR/Jethro Tull), Eddie from Ohio (a wonderful group no one has heard of) and Garrison Keillor, for my one friend who likes Guy Noir. Thanks to their better music tastes, though, I have been introduced to Corinne Bailey Rae, Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros, and Sunset Rubdown, all of whom are receiving frequent play from me.
I went to see The King's Speech* last night, and one of the most poignant parts was when Lionel Logue (the speech therapist) hypothetically asks George VI, "what are friends for?" and Bertie replies, "I wouldn't know." It's when I first realized that he didn't really have close friends, just advisors and an unkind brother. Lionel does become his friend and his family loves him, so it works out, but it got me thinking about my friends--eclectic, intelligent, funny, fabulous women that they are (and I do have predominantly female friends, not as a conscious choice, but it's just how that worked out).
I may be spending my night reading by myself, but I know they are always, always there for me. Say what you will about facebook (I'm ambiguous about it), but sometimes having an instant way to communicate with people is a wonderful thing. Modern technology plus the flash drive, and I can make it.
*WHAT A GOOD MOVIE. I have been so fond of Colin Firth for years, but this just confirmed what I already believed--he gets better in every movie that he does. We left that theater motivated to go and be brave. And that is never a bad thing.
Eddie from Ohio!!!!! YES!
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