So I once made reference to the cheapest wedding gift ever and, because I am somehow strangely attracted to the strangest of the sports world, the regift. Yet I may have outdone myself still.
In honor of an incredible wedding weekend and a party from which I may never fully recover, I promised the groom--my long-time friend Greg--that I would share with him something I wrote on my way to see him. For anyone who may not know, I keep a daily journal filled, generally, with random thoughts. The current journal is written more or less to Buxton, though not always about him.
This entry came from a layover stop just before noon on Saturday, only a few hours before the wedding. It may be the newly-crowned cheapest wedding gift ever (at least I framed the original), but I promised I would share anyway. Congratulations Greg, and expect a more appropriate gift soon.
May 16, 2009
Some day you'll do the same thing, and it'll make about as much sense then as it does now. The particulars may be a little different. You may have a window seat. But you'll do the same thing I'm doing today, and if you think long and hard enough about it beforehand you'll do it gladly.
Just like your daddy, half-squirming from that almost settled stomach and the taste of stillness on the back of your tongue, both from having dared the moon last night and beaten the sun to rise this morning. Walking slowly through darkened and fog-enclosed airport terminals in a seersucker jacket like you just won some Southern golf tournament. Listening closely with surprise as one of the better country songs playing softly fills a concourse in New Jersey.
Maybe you layover three hours in a place you only heard of before, spend less than a full day in a far-away city to save hotel money. Maybe you rent your first car. Exactly what your today looks like I have no idea, but I know you'll live it. Because a person only gets so many true, lifelong friends in this world and those friends only get so many days that completely and indescribably change their lives.
So you'll be there for them. If for nothing more than a pat on the shoulder amid the thousand other things and thoughts begging his time, you'll be there. Even if it means crying babies or middle-of-the-row seats, toll roads or foreign maps. Because it means so much more than these passing things, so long as you're there to notice it.
2 comments:
So sweet. Hopefully you'll recover from the things you saw and heard, someday :) For what it's worth, I'm glad you made the journey too. Let me know how the cheese whiz turned out.
It wasn't as bad as I originally thought. It was still cheese whiz. I did the native thing, but next time I'd probably go with good old American.
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