After the party

the morning after a party is always an amusing experience, and here is no exception. The house is awash with human detritus, a bunch of children, a horde of ants, and banana and apple pancakes. Scott is explaining how to make a film to his daughter and friend who have to make a film in japanese for school. Different world.

so. the party. It’s always interesting to see how the other half parties, and I spend an awful lot of time talking about the similarities and differences between baseball and cricket with a very drunk american, and organised two activities. The first being a baseball lesson – I need to learn to pitch, and I want to bat. He throws (well, threw …) a ninety mile an hour ball, so it’ll be interesting to see whether I can so much as lay the bat on the damn thing. He has a diamond in his back yard … and I just know he wants to hit me with a pitch. He’s that kind of guy. I’m also watching the kids play a random game of what I guess is some kind of ninja tag … which is kinda fun … but mike calls and his hangover is still rendering him fundamentally horizontal. Hey, when the rain stops, maybe it’ll all happen. And tomorrow it’s honky tonk night at The Lounge.

So. How does the day pan out? Have I anything interesting to say at all?

Well, what is odd is how strange it is being with people that I care for deeply, and with whom I have shared all manner of things, and sometimes not quite knowing what to do, what to say, and how to go about it …

So. what happened was this. My friend and I were shooting the breeze, and I got out some old photos of us, with a guy friend of ours. He was quite a character, and has a very distinctive name, so we figured we’d look him up. It took a while, but eventually we tracked what we reckoned was him down … and there were photographs and stuff … but we got a number and a couple of email accounts and sent some stuff. This morning we got a text message and a number saying call me …

naturally, we haven’t. I’ve said ‘let’s call him’ maybe five times. The answer’s always yes. And the subject closes. So, why the hell not? Well, the official answer is that she’s worried – though I’m not entirely sure about what … it’s one of those eternal mysteries … maybe she’s worried that after we seem to be getting on great the possibility of introducing a third party is outrageously dangerous. Would it put a huge fire blanket on the week if he turned out to have changed too much. What if the fey, camp, outrageously cool guy turns out to be born again, dull. Staid. So disappointing. So now we’re cooking yet more chorizo, and not picking up the phone.

They’re a thorny problem, old friends. You remember things being a certain way – or in our case you remember that you drank so much you don’t really remember, so much as invent. So we drive around in the pouring rain and have parties and generally noodle around and I listen to her talk an awful lot and we contemplate politics and all the stuff you’d expect. At the party I talk to all and sundry and mike and I walk to chris and [forgotten her name] and have a good chat after Mike’s been walked home and then Chris comes over a bit funny but hey that’s the way evenings go and and I make my excuses and leave and walk back and Julia’s sitting outside the house having a cigarette and we talk well she talks about social responsibility and I start to wonder about her mental health (in a gentle fashion) and … good god, parties are meant to be fun, holidays relaxing.

But I’m getting time to really consider myself, my direction, my raison d’etre (oh, come on. You believe that?)

No conclusion.

So, we called the guy. But that’s for another day.

There’s a certain teenageness which is universal. Often it lasts into mddle age and beyond. Dammit, J is almost 50. That is terrifying. Not for the usual reasons, that is, good god, what do I do if that happens to me, but more how in the hell does one deal with approaching old age if at 50 you’re watching the same shit as your fourteen year old daughter? But actually, it’s funny and kinda cool. We watch two shows – glee and metal-something or other. Glee is an arch teen comedy about an after school choir, and while this is the season finale, and thus a little serious, and steals a storyline directly from a cheerleading film, it suddenly becomes obvious. The first choir’s second tune is … proud mary in wheelchairs … and the second choir are deaf. The judging room is utterly fabulous, but has to be seen. The second is a cartoon about dethklock, a metal band who’ve taken over the world pretty much, and, well … one episode involves the lead guitarist looking for his father, finding his mother and deciding that he really is a god. Damn, you have to be there. Purchasement will, I believe, follow.

It’s 7 in the morning and the house stirs gently, though unwillingly, into something resembling action. All that’s really needed is coffee, however. I’m hoping the rain has permanantly abated, so that I can take a wonder around the neighbourhood, play some ball, generally get some motion happening in my poor, neglected body.