Today I am meeting up with a friend of mine who I haven't seen since I lived in Canada -- it has to be about 7 years. She moved to my school when I was eight or nine and we became friends almost instantly. Then junior high came along and I went from social butterfly to bottom-dwelling maggot, so far as the social ladder was concerned. I had no idea who New Kids on the Block were and no interest in watching Melrose Place, and my mum insisted in sending me to school in a purple paisley corduroy trouser suit thing, complete with waistcoat. No wonder I was thrown into the loser pile, I didn't want to associate with myself in that thing.
In high school I found new friends, who liked The Cranberries and Guns n' Roses and Bjork, who thought the Improv Club was pretty awesome, who preferred hanging out backstage, tweaking stage lights and dancing to 'Shaft' (damn right). She was much cooler than me and had friends with cooler extra-curricular activities.
We weren't friends for years. Then we went away to university and it turned out that not only did we pick the programme at the same school but we were in the same residence, on the same floor. Her room was next door to the international exchange student who would become one of my very favourite men in London.
Though we haven't been in touch in ages, mostly because I STINK at keeping in touch with people (it's genetic, my father is just the same, as is his father before him), I received an email the other day that read:
I don't know if you've heard, but I've moved to London! So glad to hear you're still here. Let's get together!!
I've asked Rory for your email address a million times but no luck. I remember it being erqsome... but not sure if I have the spelling right, or the email provider part. I hope this one works! If not, I'll try another.
Hope you are well!
xm
so far 3 attempts! now onto a fourth try!
How awesome is that?! So, we're hooking up this afternoon for coffee and delicious vegan chocolate cake at Foyle's.
Incidentally, that's where I met up with Camille last Friday, who is just as awesome in person as she is in writing! I really do have to write about that properly, because it was such a lovely afternoon. We had coffee, then she and her friend Seanan came with me to Shepherd's Bush for a thai vegan buffet and to watch The Woe Betides get mobbed by screaming teenagers at Bush Hall. There were young girls making out with each other and then high-fiving afterwards, and boys looking agog at such displays. And there was crowd-surfing for fuck's sake! Crowd-surfing! I would have joined in but I fear those spindly teenage arms would have splintered. We need a mosh pit of rugby players at the next gig, then I'll crowd-surf.
Aww, thanks for the shout-out. I didn't notice any girls making out, just the half-empty vodka bottles stashed in their purses. At any rate, the music was terrific, I wish they could have played for longer!
Yeah...I want to go back to London NOW!!!
Posted by: Camille | January 15, 2010 at 08:56 PM
Thats really exciting meeting up with old friends! Even better when they are just as great as we remember.
Posted by: Heather | January 15, 2010 at 01:04 AM
Yay for old friends! I linked your blog post to my old friend Brie, with whom I have a similar relationship - except we discovered that we both KNIT, so now we do cross-country KAL's. :D
There's an email headed your way! Love for the Woebies.
Posted by: Tikabelle | January 14, 2010 at 06:07 PM
Extremely awesome. There is little as happy-making as unexpectedly reconnecting with old friends.
Also, the Bush Hall gig sounds big fun, though who you are to throw around comments like "spindly arms", ms matchstick girl, I just don't know...
(I am, quite transparently, very jealous of your chic silhouette.)
Posted by: Robynn | January 14, 2010 at 03:14 PM