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"Enjoy your waning years"
Sep. 27th, 2010 09:33 amSo the party on Saturday was a blast. I'm actually not sure how to write about it. In many ways it went exactly as I expected, so it doesn't seem that there's much to say about it, and yet of course like all large parties (there were 60+ people there) it was a complex cross-section of the world that presents a lot to think about. Haven't gotten my head wrapped around it yet.
How did I spend my day? I was expecting to be awakened at o'dark thirty to help my brother put the pig on the fire, but when I got up on my own initiative around 6am, I discovered that my dad and sister-in-law had already helped him with that task. So I spent most of the rest of the morning and early afternoon sitting by the roasting pit with my brother, shooting the breeze. My eldest nephew had brought back a bottle of absinthe from Italy and had sworn the night before that we would start drinking it first thing in the morning. Sanity prevailed, and we didn't actually sample it until around 2pm. We tapped the keg of HUB's Crosstown Pale shortly thereafter, and guests started arriving at the announced starting time of 3pm.
This party was mostly for my dad's 80th and my 50th birthdays, with my nephew's 20th also in the mix. (We had a 60-30-0 party the year he was born.) There were several different groups of people at the party who tended to cluster together. There was family, including (surprisingly) my dad's sister and brother-in-law, whom I didn't expect to see because they are very conservative, plain-clothes Mennonites and there was going to be drinking going on. There were friends of my parents from Crooked River in Central Oregon, where they live. There were my friends from Seattle and Portland. There were a few of my nephew's friends. There was also a scattering of friends of my brother and sister-in-law and of the family in general. A few people I hadn't seen for decades, and a few others I hadn't seen for a few years.
I mostly hung out with my friends, but I did wander around now and again to say hello and chat with this or that cousin or uncle or old family friend. I guess the thing about such a party and such a group of old acquaintances is that it inevitably stirs up memories going all the way back to the beginning. My aunt Myrna reminisced (as she does whenever I see her) about what a bundle of energy I was at nine months old. There is something enormously comforting about being around people who have known me since I was born. We've been in this thing together, well, forever from my point of view. And it keeps going on. My niece is pregnant, and everybody is looking forward to her child. Another member of the family starting the long journey.
The friends of mine who made it were an interesting mix of people who have been my good friends for decades, people who were good friends decades ago but whom I don't see much of anymore, and people I've been getting to know better in the past decade. My friends stayed the longest of all the guests, aside from a couple of my nephew's friends who stayed overnight. When almost everybody else had left, my brother started a big fire, which was sure to keep![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
juliebata enthralled. But eventually she and holyoutlaw left, and kate_schaefer and Glenn, and Andy & Carrie, and Paul and Katherine, and Dan & Lynn Steffan (who gave me a bottle of single malt and the original artwork for Dan's splendid Corflu Zed logo). Denys, whose birthday it also was, had left a little earlier. I watched the Oregon-Arizona State football game with my niece and her husband, and the Duckies hung on to win the game. I tried my best to finish the keg, but I really could have used Martin Smith's help, may he rest in peace. I hung out with my nephew and his friend Kayla, who was a real sweetheart, full of dreams and plans for the future. The kids are all right. I'm liking the next generation.
Finally I went to bed, and slept only fitfully under the influence of a very full day and too much beer. Denys and I drove back to Seattle yesterday, taking turns driving because we were both pretty zonked. It was a great party. A nice affirmation of family, friends, and community and of the stages of life. My dad kept telling everybody that the party was my idea and it was for me, but I could tell he was really enjoying himself too. It was all good. And so on.
How did I spend my day? I was expecting to be awakened at o'dark thirty to help my brother put the pig on the fire, but when I got up on my own initiative around 6am, I discovered that my dad and sister-in-law had already helped him with that task. So I spent most of the rest of the morning and early afternoon sitting by the roasting pit with my brother, shooting the breeze. My eldest nephew had brought back a bottle of absinthe from Italy and had sworn the night before that we would start drinking it first thing in the morning. Sanity prevailed, and we didn't actually sample it until around 2pm. We tapped the keg of HUB's Crosstown Pale shortly thereafter, and guests started arriving at the announced starting time of 3pm.
This party was mostly for my dad's 80th and my 50th birthdays, with my nephew's 20th also in the mix. (We had a 60-30-0 party the year he was born.) There were several different groups of people at the party who tended to cluster together. There was family, including (surprisingly) my dad's sister and brother-in-law, whom I didn't expect to see because they are very conservative, plain-clothes Mennonites and there was going to be drinking going on. There were friends of my parents from Crooked River in Central Oregon, where they live. There were my friends from Seattle and Portland. There were a few of my nephew's friends. There was also a scattering of friends of my brother and sister-in-law and of the family in general. A few people I hadn't seen for decades, and a few others I hadn't seen for a few years.
I mostly hung out with my friends, but I did wander around now and again to say hello and chat with this or that cousin or uncle or old family friend. I guess the thing about such a party and such a group of old acquaintances is that it inevitably stirs up memories going all the way back to the beginning. My aunt Myrna reminisced (as she does whenever I see her) about what a bundle of energy I was at nine months old. There is something enormously comforting about being around people who have known me since I was born. We've been in this thing together, well, forever from my point of view. And it keeps going on. My niece is pregnant, and everybody is looking forward to her child. Another member of the family starting the long journey.
The friends of mine who made it were an interesting mix of people who have been my good friends for decades, people who were good friends decades ago but whom I don't see much of anymore, and people I've been getting to know better in the past decade. My friends stayed the longest of all the guests, aside from a couple of my nephew's friends who stayed overnight. When almost everybody else had left, my brother started a big fire, which was sure to keep
juliebata enthralled. But eventually she and holyoutlaw left, and kate_schaefer and Glenn, and Andy & Carrie, and Paul and Katherine, and Dan & Lynn Steffan (who gave me a bottle of single malt and the original artwork for Dan's splendid Corflu Zed logo). Denys, whose birthday it also was, had left a little earlier. I watched the Oregon-Arizona State football game with my niece and her husband, and the Duckies hung on to win the game. I tried my best to finish the keg, but I really could have used Martin Smith's help, may he rest in peace. I hung out with my nephew and his friend Kayla, who was a real sweetheart, full of dreams and plans for the future. The kids are all right. I'm liking the next generation.Finally I went to bed, and slept only fitfully under the influence of a very full day and too much beer. Denys and I drove back to Seattle yesterday, taking turns driving because we were both pretty zonked. It was a great party. A nice affirmation of family, friends, and community and of the stages of life. My dad kept telling everybody that the party was my idea and it was for me, but I could tell he was really enjoying himself too. It was all good. And so on.
