“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” ~
When Chris proposed a Boston stop on his cross-country summer expedition, I wasn’t sure it would work out. Our lives have altered so drastically since COVID, and while I was secure in our friendship, I didn’t take anything for granted, nor did I count on something good happening before it actually did. That’s taken quite a lot of the enjoyment and fun out of life for me, as so much of my experience was in living things out in joyful anticipation of what was to come. Unsure of how anything might play out these days, I’ve halted my happy hopes to stave off any possible disappointment. After all, Chris was to have joined us on the perfectly-planned out Plaza weekend in New York City that never came to pass. We’re both still shook from that. So when we planned to rendezvous in Boston last weekend, I held my excitement in check until we actually sat down to a charcuterie plate in the condo and toasted with mocktails the reunion that was almost two years in the making.
You may tire of me as our December sun is setting because I’m not who I used to be
No longer easy on the eyes but these wrinkles masterfully disguise
The youthful boy below who turned your way and saw
Something he was not looking for: both a beginning and an end
But now he lives inside someone he does not recognize
When he catches his reflection on accident…
Boston was welcoming at first, but I knew the rain would come. Chris didn’t heed my advice to bring an umbrella, to his almost-instant regret, but he insisted it wasn’t about the weather, it was the company. I caught a few flowers along Southwest Corridor Park before the rain arrived.
On our way to a dinner at Terra, we had our first encounter with a family of rabbits who would greet us almost every time we returned to the condo. I thought of Andy and missed him.
Treating Chris to an early birthday dinner was supposed to be a surprise until we sat down and the birthday dessert arrived, but the hostess decided to ruin the surprise by welcoming us to our birthday dinner. She was apologetic about it, and honestly, at our ages, a little ruined surprise isn’t a big deal. It’s the company that counts.
It was our first joint foray into the world of dining and entertainment post-COVID, and we kept the party going with a mocktail at the Fairmont Plaza, followed by a post-dinner snack at Earl’s. Boston felt alive, even as a downpour descended, one which would not abate until the next day.
We made it back to the condo, soaked and tired and somehow happier for having returned to the comforting warmth of a friendship that we’d known for more years than we were strangers to each other. Twenty six years of camaraderie and support.
On the back of a motor bike
With your arms outstretched trying to take flight
Leaving everything behind
But even at our swiftest speed we couldn’t break from the concrete
In the city where we still reside.
And I have learned that even landlocked lovers yearn for the sea like navy men
Cause now we say goodnight from our own separate sides
Like brothers on a hotel bed
Like brothers on a hotel bed
A brief break in the rain the next day allowed for us to walk along the Esplanade after Chris was finished with his work and I’d done some shopping downtown. The mark of any successful journey together is spending a few hours apart – it’s a science that Chris and I have perfected over years of trial and error (originally honed by a trip to Disneyworld with Suzie). Good friends allow that space for solitude, and we were both better for it. When we returned to the condo for a lengthy walk to dinner, the break in rain continued, but the wind and cooler temperatures left Boston with a chill more customary to the fall.
Many years ago, when we first met, we would take similar walks in various cities – San Francisco, New York, and Boston too – trying to figure out life, trying to see how we fit into the world. We could conjure those memories and compare them to where we are today, and some of the most basic questions still remained. We’ve grown in different ways, taken different roads, but meeting up again felt like we’d merely been traveling in parallel directions, just one street away from each other. True friendship is like that.
The rain returned, so we ordered a car to dinner at Time Out Market, where Skip and I had just enjoyed a meal, and where a DJ-fueled scene would likely be what Chris was hunting. We enjoyed the first dinner of the evening, then stopped at the Cask & Flagon near Fenway and the famed neon Citgo sign. A brush with the Boston Red Sox was better than no Red Sox game at all.
Weather-wise, the night had taken a turn for the worse, with a bone-chilling wind and rain that pelted like it was November. Ducking into the lobby of the Hotel Commonwealth, we warmed ourselves while I tried to figure out where we might find a cup of hot tea. That’s where we are at this stage of our lives. No martini, no highball, not beer – just a search for a cup of hot tea. I was fine with that though, and Chris managed to stay true to his proclamation that it was about the company.
We wound up at one of the few places open late now for food and drink: Solas at the Lenox Hotel. Happy memories had been made here before – and wonderful moments with Skip, and JoAnn, and Andy – all of which flooded back as we ordered our second dinner of the night. We seemed to have replaced drinking with eating, and we were both better off for the switch, even as our stomachs moaned with the load.
A walk back to the condo was the best thing for us, and the rain had slightly let up. In the queasy light of the midnight hour, the family of rabbits greeted us again. I was due to depart the next day, while Chris stayed in town for one more night. Boston went to sleep in the rain…
