I’m furious because my sulk has been interrupted and now I have a confession to make.
I made a new friend recently. It happened like it does in the movies, when I least expected it, but also while my hair looked absolutely fantastic and I was basically ready for my closeup.
I wasn’t looking for friendship, I had written friendship off. I had plenty of friends, most of them on friendship probation, of course, but still, plenty of friends.
And then I met her. On the bleachers, watching baseball. Our sons are on the same tournament team, she made some comment, I laughed, so I liked her.
But then yesterday, as she was calling her son, she dropped her voice and said “Luuuuke, I am your mother” all Darth-Vadery and shit and I just knew that I needed to have some kind of friendship commitment ceremony to lock her in.
“That is so funny,” I told her.
She told me that she was a huge Star Wars fan and wanted to name her son Luke Skywalker Schwartz, but that her husband wouldn’t let her.
“Why does he have to ruin everything?” I asked, suddenly enraged. I didn’t ask her to choose between me and him, though, because some people are touchy about stuff like that. At least until they get to know me better, at which time they welcome the chance to shed the ball and chain.
So we chatted some more and then she pointed to a spot in a park (we were playing on a new to us field, and by “we” I mean “our sons”) and said “I think there’s a bar there, and they probably have cocktails.”
I looked to where she was pointing and saw some promising signs. “What if they do have cocktails?” I asked.
“What, is the heat getting to you, Marinka?” she asked me, “If they have cocktails, we’re drinking them and getting looped.”
And so my sulk ended.
Because it’s really hard to sulk while you’re having a glass of Sauvignon Blanc with a new friend and watching your kid hit a home run.
Not impossible, but hard.