Pity Patty

You will see here a picture of my good friend, Patty. As you can tell, she is expounding on something....she is ALWAYS expounding on something. That’s okay because she’s smart and I love to listen to her expound. We drop in and out of each other’s lives but never totally disconnect. We may go for weeks without talking and then meet for dinner somewhere. It is as if no time elapsed since our last sit-about. We are kindred souls, of a sort. Both have seen our share of pain and heartache...both have struggled with family issues...both working when most of our friends are retired & sipping cocktails on some sunny shore. But, no, here we are, residing where it is so dad-blamed cold that icicles form when you spit. (Of course, neither she nor I would ever lower ourselves to spitting). Let me give you a tip about "roughing it" in Wisconsin in the winter. NEVER, and I repeat, NEVER use a port-a-potty for ANY reason...better to wet your pants and suffer the consequences. Trust me on this!

Anyway, Patty and I have not been life long friends~at least not in years. We met through a mutual friend of ours, Barry (the singer-yes-yes-I’ll tell you more about him another time). He came to our house (about 15 years ago) to watch a football game and brought her along. Now, the funny thing is, I don’t think either of us watched a minute of football-we were too busy gabbing. After we had talked for about an hour she looked at me with her haughty-eyed look and said, "I don’t know if I like you or not-you may be funnier than I am!" Well, Lord love her, at least she was honest about it! I find that when we are together we are each other’s best audience...which means that occasionally one of us has to stop and listen. Why is life so hard sometimes?

I will give you one quick story about her. We went to a women’s retreat and were sitting at a back table (imagine that-isn’t that where ALL the naughty ones always sit)? Anyway, the speaker was one of those people that was quite "taken" with herself-you know the type-more interested in hearing themselves talk than making a point. Well, she started to tell a sad, sad, and I mean REALLY sad story, about someone she knew that had been working under their car in a garage and , because it was dark in there, lit a match and the gasoline around them went up like a torch and they were burned. See? I TOLD YOU it was sad. Now, Patty and I looked at each other and she mouthed, "What kind of idiot lights a match when they are under a car?" You know how it is sometimes when emotions are close to the surface? There’s a fine line between crying and laughing? Well....... I started laughing, quietly at first, just the held in snicker~ her face got red and she started quivering. I started shaking in earnest and she was holding her hand over her mouth to keep the snorting to a minimum. Everyone (all the NORMAL people) around us were crying-some of them almost sobbing. I put my head down on the table and the person on the other side of me ( a stranger to both of us) started patting my back to "comfort" me (thinking I was sobbing aloud). My daughter, Mimi, who was on the other side of Patty, made her switch seats so she could separate us. At this point my GOOD FRIEND, Patty, got up and left me sitting there with some stranger "consoling" me.

God Bless that Patty~ That reminds me...I haven’t seen her in a while-I think it’s about time for our Spring luncheon- There’s an old saying about payback but I’m too nice to write it! Let’s just say.....She’s got one coming!

Side note~By the way, lest you think I am callous and unfeeling. the burned person recovered completely