Sunday, August 21, 2011

FRIENDS INDEED

WE HAVE SOME FRIENDS and you've met them in these pages. Diane and her husband, Roger, are people we've known for over 20 years. We keep in touch by meeting for a meal every week, one of the best ways to keep a friendship alive and nurtured. It used to be dinner at 4 on Friday afternoons, an unusually early hour but one that assured being seated without a wait. I named it The Twilight Supper Club. If you've been reading this blog for years (It used to be named The Retired Printer and the Bookseller before it went belly up due to corruption.....the computer kind), you'll remember when we decided to visit all the restaurants in the area alphabetically. It took us a year and a half, but we did it and learned a lot in the process. For a while we set ourselves the challenge of setting the self timer to photograph all of us. One of the rules was that we had to get the name of the restaurant into the picture. It was fun at the time; and later too much of a hassle.


I started out this morning to tell you of my Saturday morning adventure yesterday, but the blog has a mind of its own and it decided to take a different direction. It's sort of nice to know what I'm going to write about tomorrow and that's rarely the case.

We get together with Diane and Roger on holidays, too, often including Tim and our mutual friend, Fiona. I've known her for nearly 50 years starting when Tim was in the stroller and we used to stand outside her antique shop and watch her change her display windows. I wouldn't take a baby into the store, so she and I corresponded up a storm even though we lived within walking distance. She's the one who talked me into opening a bookshop. I did, ran it for 37 years, sold it 8 years ago and Fiona is still running her antique shop. She's what's known as a better man than I.

I'm not quite as militant as I used to be about getting the group together for a photo and then I'm sorry afterward, because the collection that we do have tells a continuing story. I must get back to doing that. It's worth the effort.





Roger, has had a couple of years dealing with serious health problems......remember when we celebrated last Thanksgiving in the hospital cafeteria and he and Mr.Bob were in physical therapy at the same time? He's doing very well now, able to continue working. He's the one who taught me most of what I know about working on the computer, he being a doctor of computer science.



And Diane is a fiber artist who has written a wonderful book, now out of print and currently is teaching a needlepoint class in her home. I'll tell you a little about their home tomorrow. It's a splendid place and why we're so lucky to have these people as friends, I'll never quite understand. But I give thanks and more thanks as time goes by.




Time to say goodbye to these two friends and God willing, I'll tell you more tomorrow.




"Books and friends should be few but good."

5 comments:

  1. Do you and your friends engage a stylist and a stager? Your group is BEAUTIFULLY coiffed and dressed and coordinated!!!!! LOVELY!!!!!

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  2. Thank you so much again Jane. Friends......i know A lady I WORK WITH WHO MEETS HER TWO GOOD FRIENDS EVERY TUESDAY EVENING FOR DINNER...FOR YEARS AND YEARS. She invites me long when i can and it is a delight! You have done the same....wonderful. I also love that Tim comes along...How nice is that! Keep on keeping on......

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  3. I feel as if I know all of them now, having seen flickr photos and read your blogs for some time. They do sound like dear people, and I feel quite certain they would say that they are very lucky to have had you two in their lives as well.

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  4. Lovely to hear about your friends and to try to guess which restaurant you were at. WLT and I also play the alphabet game with restaurants but we get in the car and the first license plate letter of the third car to pass us reveals the first letter of the restaurant we must go to. Since we both have favorite restaurants starting with "L" that one doesn't count. His is Label's Tables on Mulholland in Calabasas and mine is Lupe's, which is almost the exact same food as El Charro's...right down to the black olives on the tacos.
    T.O. Joanne

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  5. No stylist. No stager. Diane contends that presentation is everything and sets out to prove it, especially at the dining table.

    We're lucky to have several fine friends and the practice of meeting regularly does pay off in keeping the friendships strong. Otherwise it's just a "we must get together sometime" that never quite materializes until the next funeral.

    I LOVE the license plate game and wonder if Mr. Bob would go along with it?

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