Old Friends

It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

As we have for MANY of the last twenty-six years, Jim and I rang in the new year with our oldest friends, Dawn and Scott. Scott and Jim were in Navy boot camp together back in 1985 and Dawn and I became penpals shortly after that. We married only eight days apart in 1986 and grew close when the guys were both stationed in Norfolk, Virginia. I could tell you lots more about our history but I already wrote about it extensively four years ago, HERE. (You’ll want to click that: I included a picture from my late, great beagle’s first birthday party.)

Anyway, because it’s the 21st century, our smart phones were a part of our traditional New Year’s Eve card games (Spades). Dawn and I were uploading both pictures and trash-talk (Jim was, too. Scott was not: he’s got the smart phone but no Facebook account.), and when I sent this picture, captioned with “The tiaras have come off. It’s getting all serious up in here. Sort of. ::spirit fingers::” through to Instagram and subsequently to Twitter,

Go girls!

one of my friends tweeted back, “Somebody is drunking! :)”

The funny thing is that no, nobody was “drunking” at that point (ahem, YET.). That’s how we always are when we’re together. Ralph Waldo Emerson was totally right: the thing about old friends is that you can feel safe about being as stupid (whether “stupid” means silly or non-smart) as you want to be. Stupid is acceptable with the best kind of old friends. Way, way, way back in the day, Dawn and I used to have sleepovers when the guys were out to sea and would often break into a ballet dance in the living room. We haven’t done it lately BUT if one of us were to get up and start it, the other would follow, no question.

When we play cards, she and I work in the spirit fingers, clapping (Go! *clap* Girls! *clap* and other varieties), “Woohoo”-ing, and all kinds of other silliness.

There’s something special about picking up where you leave off with old friends and carrying out long-standing traditions with them. It was a great way to start 2013 for Jim and me, that’s for sure!

Thumb embellishment courtesy of @BeingPeachy

Thumb embellishment courtesy of @BeingPeachy

 
Happy New Year, everyone!

Note: I was also going to give you more of a run-down of last night’s events, but I wrote about it three FOUR years ago (Guess I’d better get used to 2013, huh?) and if you read it here, you’ll see how it went last night all except for the kids (who made their own plans this year), the dogs (Roxie stayed home and Dawn and Scott’s dog Hobo Jake was on duty last night–Dutch passed away a couple of years ago), the Black Jack Cola (I didn’t bring any this year), and the Lord of the Rings glasses (we used plastic last night). OTHER THAN THOSE ELEMENTS, the evening was pretty much the same old fun as usual. I loved every minute of it.

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