Recently, as most of you know, I spent a weekend with some friends from college. I love these friends; they've known me for a LOOOONG time and are still fabulous women who want to see me. I am amazed every time I think about this. They're so great that I would want to be friends with them now even if I'd just MET them, so that's pretty high praise of their greatness.
However, being with them reminds me of just how poor my memory is. For example, I had forgotten that we had a "suite cat" for a while during the 2 years we lived together. A CAT.
I forgot a CAT!
I remember the fancy-schmancy makeup mirrors that 2 of us had, and the hours and HOURS spent primping in from of them, trying out all kinds of 80's eyeshadow combinations, but I forget a CAT.
I remember kissing a boyfriend in the basement of the library wing while it was under construction, and what he called his cartooned baseball (Thoreau, y'all.) but I forget a cat.
I remember steak nights at D-hall and the chili and homemade bread on Fridays at Chandler and the walk to "up campus" and getting my mail at the student union and what the lobby of Wine-Price looked like and how to cut through Wilson Hall to get to the quad, but I forget a CAT.
I remember pink overalls and blue oxford shirts and polos layered under oxfords layered under sweaters and popped collars and boat shoes and painter's pants and web belts and fire-engine red chinos, but not the cat.
I REALLY don't remember the sounds the cat made when we brought shrimp back from D-hall.
But 2 of my friends did. One of them in a spooky kind of "brain of steel" way that makes me fret about just how obtuse I am to have forgotten these things.
And I wonder, all that time she was drinking those sloe gin fizzes way back then, did she know something about its special brain-enhancing powers that the rest of us didn't? Because, man, even though that stuff is foul, I might have switched over to keep a few more synapses firing.
Because all that Busch beer I drank (quarters, anyone?) didn't help a whole lot, as far as I can tell.
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Mmmm, beer. Beer in pitchers. Beer in pitchers that you buy for $2.50 and drink out of plastic cups while sitting at JM's on Friday afternoon listening to Flock of Seagulls or Wham or Duran Duran or Bruce Sprinsteen or Madonna or Prince and hoping that the cute guy sitting next to you in the booth will have to scoot over so that your thigh will touch his and maybe he'll feel a little bit of "like" for you and maybe something will start at long last because you've been friends for long enough and want a little something more and the beer is helping you to feel like maybe you're pretty cute and this might just be the night that when "Little Red Corvette" comes on he'll take you to the dance floor and breathe in your ear while you try to find the beat together.
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Yep, maybe THAT'S why I can't remember the cat.
9 comments:
I have another of those mini-reunions coming up in a couple of weeks. Last one was a shocker when an old hippie friend showed up as the absent-minded professor. The absent-minded I understood, but a real live professor?
It's usually best to forget cats anyway. Maybe your mind is just better at keeping the bad stuff at bay, Tiff. (cats = bad stuff)
Even though it's a girl drink, I always liked Sloe Gin Fizzes but for some reason I usually ended up drinking Kamikazis when I was in college.
I think we all have selective memories. I remember the cat's name even (Statler) as well as that funny sound he made behind the couch with the shrimp (grrr-grrr-grrr). I even remember those red chinos. But I'd forgotten all about my heavy-handedness in matchmaking with you and a certain young man. So we're even. It is ms. "brain of steel" who's the aberration, methinks. Or mehopes.
Somewhere there's an elderly cat saying "No, sorry, I don't remember a girl who wore pink overalls and blue oxford shirts...but I remember that can of deluxe Meow Mix!"
rick - is there any other kind?
utenzi - kamikazis and backgammon were some of my fondest fuzzy memories of college.
OF - metoo! Like we've sid before, if we all put our heads together we might have the REAL college years.
3carnations - that cat would be BEYOND elderly at this point! Hee!
Hey! I resemble some of those remarks! Do you remember the rabbit? (No name comes to mind.) He could jump vertically about 4 feet, so no "cage" we assembled could contain him. And he had a penchant for shoes.... I do agree about putting all our thinkers together and getting a more realistic perspective about college, though. Hmmmmm, Doublemint Gum + Polo = ?
hov62 - Cadbury, ad The Quitter e-mailed earlier, was the rabbit's name. Doublemint gum + polo = the guy who showed me that black people do get tans. I was so very naive back then....
how anyone forgets pussy - named after the coolest Muppet, no less - is beyond me.
hyperion - an excellent question. I'll just bet you can tell us all about every single one you've ever had.
And Fozzie was the coolest Muppet, duh.
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