At long last, we found a slot of time between her married life and busy schedule and my unmarried life and apparent inability to accomplish the one goal which would enable me to go and see her (paper writing...I finished, by the way! Only edits and online submission stand between me and freedom now).
The day started with coffee, as it should. We sat and chatted for I don't know how long in my living room, Cubby ever watchful.
Then, after what seemed like an endless struggle against mutual indecisiveness, we headed on down to Brookside. It's this super trendy part of town with restaurants, coffee shops, and shops with stuff that are super cool, but you can't help but wonder who the heck buys from them.
In Brookside, we split lunch and had high-five one of three for the day. When you share food and end up with the perfect amount, you need to high-five. There's an unspoken law.
Shades of Lame came next. It's actually called Shades of Brown, but my camp friend Annie Paige always used to refer to it as Shades of Lame, and I've never been able to rewrite it back to the original in my mind.
Probably because I think it's a definite shade of lame. It's like if a hipster were on hipster steroids. Except that it's so hipster, it's not even hipster anymore. It's just kind of uppity and I feel judged when I go in. Because they are, in fact, judging me.
But Caity likes it, and anything with Caity is fun. So, we drank an eggnog latte and a brown sugar latte and talked and talked (so sorry to fellow coffee goers). On the list of subjects were people we went to high school with, how everyone we've ever met seems to be getting engaged, Joel Osteen, books we're reading or want to read, and how creepy the guy across from us was.
Seriously, he was either tripping or had some sort of serious social dysfunction, but this guy across from us just sat there, blatantly staring, grinning, shaking his head, grunting or chuckling in response to our conversation, and giving us thumbs-ups.
Then he'd leave.
Then he'd come back.
In the end, we left and went on a quest to find little HayHay a Christmas present (SHE'S CURRENTLY ON A PLANE HOME TO US OHMYGOSH).
Mostly it just ended in us feeling really bad for the overly friendly store owners. "Well, she doesn't wear jewelry, she doesn't like trinkets, she doesn't do a whole lot of recreational reading, she lives in China, so it has to be small, no, still no trinkets"...etc.
Usually, to find her a present, we just have to wander around stores until the muse reveals the correct gift. It's a serious struggle. Thus, the reason I didn't come up with anything to give her from NI.
Caity, on the other hand, has a veritable stash in my closet. She's the easiest person for me to find gifts for.
The rest of the evening was a blur of more chatting, searching, food, and ice cream on the kitchen floor.
The best purchase (only purchase) of the day was a bowl shaped like a lettuce leaf. Since my freshman year of college, I've kind of been amassing ceramic cups, plates, bowls in the shape of fruits and vegetables. Not like have pictures of fruits or veggies, they actually look like they're made of them.
I have a plumb cup, an apple cup, an asparagus cup, a lettuce bowl, and I used to have three more cups made of carrots, cabbage, and corn, respectively, but I have since given those away. Jansie hates them. I think they're great.
It was great, having Caity back. I'm never worried about our friendship, but it's such a pleasure to interact in-person instead of Skyping.
I guess we sort of take each other for granted in that way, but it's a good way. We can move apart, make new friends, and alter the make-up of our everyday lives, but I always know she'll answer her phone if I need her to think up a word for me and she knows I'll always edit her writing.
We'll forever share inside jokes, books, and our life stories. She's my best friend, what can I say?
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