Perfect Moments
I am amazingly sentimental, and when it comes to anniversaries, I tend to obsess. I realized this week that 30 years ago I finished college, moved to Minnesota and started my jobs at a juvenile justice group home that doesn’t exist anymore and a comic shop that doesn’t exist anymore.
I am going to record a podcast about that shift soon (and it’s along the lines of the song “That’s how I got to Memphis” if The Newsroom gave you a deep, abiding love of that one). But one thing I remember was a day when I was all done with college, had finished up my college jobs (they were for students only) and was sharing a house with a woman I was in love with.
It was a cool early summer morning, the radio was playing, and we had had a light breakfast, and we just sitting around, reading and enjoying each other’s company. I stopped what I was doing and said, “We need to treasure this. All is right in our lives, things are peaceful and relaxed. This is a perfect moment. Soon, we’ll have to worry about jobs and money and other things, but for now, everything is where it should be.” I was right. In the years since, those “perfect moments” have been few and far between, but they are to be treasured:
-Watching Batman Returns with my son at the drive in as a Thunderstorm slowly moved toward us
-A warm evening on the patio at Uncommon Ground where I was reading, a couple of people were working out a new song on a guitar, and people walked by on their way to their Friday night activities
-Reading the New York Times with Gene Colan before a comic convention stared for the day and talking movies
-Shooting pool with a woman I loved the day she moved in with me
–Nights on my deck, reading comics with a cold beverage as the sun went down
-Watching the X-Files cuddled together on a couch and talking about the future during the commercials.
-A road trip with music playing and singing along to the music.
-A long conversation with a future friend at a coffee house
-Having a conversation while wandering the streets of St Paul through twilight
-Sitting on the banks of the river in Stillwater after going through antique stores
-Driving a drunk woman home as she muttered on and on about how much she loved me
-Taking my son to his first showing of Rocky Horror Picture Show
-The glorious, amazing all night multi-theater horror movie fest on Halloween
Moments where all is right with the world are fleeting, special and should be treasured.
Much love to friends old and new, and what are some of YOUR perfect moments?
