“Thank god I don’t mind insults!” Kira says as we bundle up against a chilly Boston morning.
“Yes, because you are dressed for insults,” I reply.
It’s our usual banter, but for some reason I want to remember it. I pause to type the exchange quickly into my phone.
“Are you writing what I’m saying?” she demands. “Is this going to be in your blog?”
The winter sun is brilliant. The wind isn’t too strong. Spring wasn’t quite in the air yet, but it was close.
“I don’t know yet,” I finally answer. “Hopefully something better will come out of your mouth.”
A brisk Saturday morning begins with some croissants from Cafe Madeleine. After Friday’s home-based splashdown into town, we awake early, refreshed and ready to explore the city. If we’re feeling especially arty or are looking for some sort of inspiration, we may visit the Museum of Fine Arts or the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. If we’re feeling adventurous (and the Red Line is running that way) we may head over the river into Cambridge. For the most part, however, we tend to feel like a day of shopping and hotel lobby hopping, where we rest and recuperate in between our walks.
Lately we’ve been heading back to the condo by early afternoon, to enjoy a siesta, the duration of which seems to grow longer and longer the older we get. The last time I was there I also introduced Kira to some meditation. It’s a world away from our afternoons and nights in the 90’s, some of which I no longer even remember. Happily, it’s a better world.
We will finish whatever movie we fell asleep through the night before, as the afternoon sun streams into the bedroom bay window. I will scroll through the offerings on OpenTable for later that evening, and then we’ll head into the kitchen to get some nuts and olives and some fancy mocktail dolled up with a couple of citrus twists. Often at these times I’ll be struck with a pang of the thought of the next morning – the sadness of a Sunday – and I’ll make plans for our next get-together. I’ve been trying to live in the moment rather than in some future indeterminate time that may or may not come to fruition; I don’t always succeed. Here, in the transition from day to night, we talk about the future, and that leaves me with hope.
Dressing for dinner, which once upon a time took up a preponderance of effort and consideration, has now become a rushed bit of a chore, which is how it should be when in the company of a trusted friend. I still get some kicks out of putting on something fancy, but it matters less these days. Kira never put much stock in such silliness. Conversation and togetherness means more. It always did.
And so we would find ourselves at Saturday night dinner, decked out as much as we wanted to muster, realizing that all those little in-between moments were where the real dazzle and excitement was. How fortunate to find it so, as there are so many more in-between moments than fancy, dressy dinners.
The world was shifting before we even knew it was shifting. That’s often the way. Kira has spent the last few years teaching me, mostly through her own resilient example, how to embrace change, to lean into it and accept it as a challenge, and a way of bettering oneself. Back at the condo, we would usually scrounge the fridge and freezer for some sweet treat to accompany a cup of tea, and Saturday night would come to an all-too-swift close.
It feels somewhat distant now, and with each day it grows a little fuzzier. Maybe that’s why I make such efforts to document the time we spend together. I don’t want that world to go away just yet. That’s my fear of change. It’s a small fear though, and a rather insignificant one when I pause to fully analyze it, because time and and distance can never fracture the kind of friendship I share with Kira.
We will be back together in Boston at some point – maybe not this month, maybe not this summer, maybe not this fall – but one day I know we will be back together. All of us.
