Jeanne Gauddah Menguito introduced me to my vietnamese spring roll habit. here she is cooking my all time favorite, cha-gio.i get a call from a somewhat long-lost buddy of mine, bobby menguito, inviting me to
(groan) his son's 6yr. old birthday party.
the catch: 113 miles door-to-door.
perhaps sensing my hesitation due to the distance
(he is unaware that i consider children's parties to be no picnic)
he decides to up the ante: "okay i was going to surprise you, but my mother is in town visiting....."
DONE. he remembers my weak spot.
the thing about reconnecting with old friends is, you are never sure of what to expect.
like revisiting a familiar place after many years, or watching that movie you enjoyed half a century ago.
will it be as beautiful as you remember it to be?
as large? as safe? as clean? as entertaining? as smart? as funny?
am i?
the other day i was on the phone with an old friend that i had gone to grade school and high school with.
the last time jerelina and i spoke was in 1986.
we literally knew each other half our lives
and then we lost touch for the other half.
how do you bridge the twenty year gap in a telephone call?
once we got acclimated to the sound of each others' voices, we launched into yesterday, today and a bit of tomorrow on fast forward.
we touched on relationships, culture, abortion, the word astig, crippling vices, death, love, careers, whatever-happened-to..., in 38 minutes.
that movie "Working Girl" was enjoyable to me in
1988 and it still is today.
with a plate of cha-gio in front of me, it is perfect.