Challenging

He reminded me of a friend with his clear blue eyes, thick brown hair, ripped jeans.

He started a recording business with friends. They own their own studio in midtown, spending twice my rent on two small rooms with boards and instruments and a sound booth. They use phrases like "the last time he was in Africa" and "when we were in Lisbon."

He met my friend in South America. He was there doing sound on a film. I've heard that my friend's cat made it into the film but I haven't seen it. The film. Or the cat, for that matter. The cat's still in South America.

He's younger than me, the recording artist, producer, mixer, the boy in the plain white T-shirt. The sports sandals. A rubber band around his wrist. He made me think of places I wanted to visit. Places I wanted to live. Things I wanted to do.

Nobody dreams of being a financial analyst or consultant or training specialist as a child. Little girls don't tell Barbie that she'll be paying for repairs on that pink plastic Corvette or that she'll do so by selling her soul to the man and working nine to five or eight to five or eight to seven every day, worrying about work on the weekends, taking calls on vacation.

Owning a sound studio and traveling the world to meet and track down bands is cool.

We drank beer without him. I think that somebody was supposed to call but it wasn't me. I did call a friend in town for training. We met on a corner in the Lower East Side. I shouted "I'm kitty corner across from Whole Foods" into my phone as she said "I'm alone in New York" and "we hear the same sirens."

I believe the proper term is "cater corner" or "quatre corner" but it doesn't matter. I say "kitty" and she found me, us. Our friend.

A lot of friends found us throughout the night and would the rest of the weekend. One girl wouldn't make it because of a last minute trip to Uganda, to save the world or whatever. Another girl had just flown back to San Francisco. A couple of boys – men – were in Korea teaching English. Some people just wouldn't or couldn't make it. Life got in the way. But people did fly in from as close as Boston and as far as Africa. It would be good.

They would challenge me, my life, the decisions I've made, this group of idealists, of RPCVs, of fair traders and sound mixers and international aid workers who drink and roll their own cigarettes, play other peoples' guitars in other peoples' living rooms and carry notebooks and cameras everywhere. Who know what it's like to have money and to have nothing at all and to try to give back to the country where they served. It would be fun. So far, it is.


Tag: Friends