Rehearsing for The End of the World

     
     I've just spent a couple of days in Arnold, California with Armando Silva and Roland Langlois. We've been the best of friends for almost 40 years and the stories that we've generated are epic. There are no words with which to truly define the depth of our relationships. Primarily, we laugh. A lot. There have been times when we had to lie on the floor and curl into fetal positions and beg the others to stop laughing so that we could breathe. We are still able to do that and I couldn't be more delighted. We have listened to music, watched baseball, gone camping, lost friends, been married and divorced,  drunk and sober, worked, retired, become ill and recovered. There are children and wives and houses and all of the stuff that life is composed of but mostly, every time we see each other, we laugh like madmen. These men are immensely smart and funny but the level of humor varies widely. We are crude occasionally, and also sad and stupid and silly but there have been astonishing romantic episodes, deep heartbreak and innumerable late night conversations that border on the profound, the philosophical and, often, the seriously insane. We tried to duplicate the above photo that Armando pulled out of a drawer. None of us (not one of us) can remember where and when it was made. We calculate it was taken between 25 and thirty years ago. We analyzed haircuts, eyeglasses, dentition, but we were completely at a loss. In those days alcohol and drugs were generally a part of every gathering and the only thing we can conclude is that we may have been loaded. Or not. Forgetting is part of getting old. I'm completely happy that we are lifelong friends. Fuck age, fuck sickness and death and forgetting. Just Fuck It. We laugh at death. We laugh at everything. We should be more adult, I guess, but that bell has been rung, that ship has sailed, the horse has left the barn. I'm sure I can think of other metaphors to indicate that I no longer give a crap, or have time for guilt, fear, the feelings of other people.
     I'll post more as this road trip unrolls and I slip into the past, drive around California, confront the present and run from the future. By the way, isn't the quality of the picture from the unremembered photo booth  a lot better than the one taken with the iPad?