we meet at four. I'm early. she's late. we know who we are. I smile thinking about it, and, if I smile thinking about it, you already know how we laugh when I get in her car. she's never seen me this vulnerable but she was the one last week with tears in her eyes. we spend at least an hour and fifteen minutes sharing, touching, waiting, and loving each other and the woman in the backseat.
behind us is that beautiful young woman's mama.
I almost took the camera but I didn't because I'm selfish. I just needed an evening with them. you only get to read the writing but you certainly would have been invited.
the lyrics to our music are our stories to each other. I force them to listen to me reading while strapped to a stage and our seats. I tell them that they must snap their fingers and they do it too early and I go, "no, no. wait. there's more." and we laugh what feels like the 5,439,618th laugh inside this car, over salad and fried green tomatoes, drinking from tin cups, and living it up. we are storytellers who witness magic. we have opinions which I call don't let me get all judgy, judgy. together we feel brilliant because somewhere along the way we were able to meet such special people. we are with each other.
Today I am grateful for a successful surgery, for news she has time and a choice she can claim as her own, to watch a young woman be able to grow into a teacher, to claim our mamas as our teachers, to not look at my phone,
and to then look at my phone when we get back into the car and say,
"He sent music."
And we celebrate with each other.
Playlist is real human laughter, Smile feat. Gloria Carter by Jay-Z, and Holy War by Alicia Keys.
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