Old Friends

Last weekend The Lawyer and I were in Austin, Texas, for The Eagles concert. We spent a little time wandering downtown and seeing a few sites. Rode down to San Antonio and toured The Alamo and strolled a little bit of the Riverwalk. All in all, it’s a lovely part of our country, full of nice folks.

Every-other-day The Lawyer sets out on a very purposeful 40 minute walk, doctor’s orders. And being the disciplined person he is, vacation doesn’t stop him. Sometimes he goes alone while I go to the hotel gym, other times he invites me along on his journey, especially if there is potential to see cool new sites. This trip may take the cake. At least in my mind.

We had a lose plan to keep his fast pace until we got to the Texas Capitol, then pause the app and slow stroll and see the sites, then pick up and go again. Well, we did, ish. Now, it will be impossible for me to fully describe, explain, make sense of, or help you understand the synaptic breakdown that occured between my ears, but when has that ever stopped me from trying.

As we were approaching the side of the Capitol, we stepped into a side drive with curb parking. A man had just parked, got out of his vehicle, and began to walk in the same direction. As we neared him The Lawyer turned toward him, which was away from me, and began a lively conversation with him. They shook hands and laughed and began talking like old friends. Synaptic breakdown number one.

Like I said, The Lawyer turned away from me to speak to this man, so coupled with the fact that it’s early and I’m already not firing on all cylinders, I have mild hearing loss (thank you 30 years of a hairdryer in my ear) and when The Lawyer isn’t facing me, sometimes I just can’t hear everything. This was most definitely the case. All I heard was laughter and indecipherable words and then one word, “Perry.” Synaptic breakdown number two, which will be explained in greater detail later. And then you’ll want to send me to my therapist.

At this point I’m trying to figure out just how in the heck The Lawyer knows someone in Austin, Texas, and what are the chances of running in to them at the state Capitol, because the way these two yayhoos are yucking it up, I’m convinced they know each other. Synaptic breakdown number three.

We keep walking with this gentleman toward the side steps of the building, because why wouldn’t you walk with your long lost friend wherever they’re going? Then The Lawyer said to this stranger-to-me friend of his, “let me introduce you to my wife.” Or something to that effect. You see, The Lawyer has a standard phrase he uses when he wants to introduce me to someone he knows, but he knows they’ve not met me before. I can’t spew it verbatim right this minute, but I know it when I hear it, and it was it. Furthered my adherence to my story in my head that they know one another. The synaptic breakdowns continue.

I offered my hand and said, “hi, I’m Sharon,” which is my standard phrase, because, well, just call me Sharon. And this fool (in my mind) looks at me and says, “and what’s your last name?” Now look. You know my husband so it’s a pretty good chance you know my last name. But my mama taught me not to be rude, so I answered and tried so hard not to look at him like he had three eyeballs. Not sure if I succeeded. But then he laughed, pointed to The Lawyer, and said, “and you’re hanging out with this guy??” just like old friends would do if they were ragging each other after years apart. I’m telling y’all, at this point I am so thoroughly convinced they’re old friends, I’d have put your paycheck on it.

I laughed right along with and responded with something to the effect of, “well, he takes me cool places, so yeah, I’m along for the ride.” And we all laughed and laughed some more.

Then again with The Lawyer turning his head away from me to talk. He said something to the man about The Air Force and the man and he talked about their military service and flying airships and they are just having the grandest conversation as we are now on the side porch of the Capitol because this man just kind of brought us on along his journey and now we’ve stopped walking because old friends just stand around and talk like that, right? The synaptic breakdowns are ricocheting all through my grey matter. And yet I’m still smiling and laughing and trying to figure out who in the heck this man is in The Lawyer’s life.

I’m getting nowhere. But this conversation is great fun! They talk about flying helicopters and how successful they both were not the first time they tried to hover. They talk about how long they served. They talk about The Lawyer being a lawyer, but dang it, no indication of what this man did after he got out of the military. I’m lost as a golfball in high weeds. But still laughing. Then he looks at me and says, “and what do you do?”

Ooohhhhh the things that run through my head in a nanosecond when someone asks me this. First up, always, is the “I’m just a hairdresser” comment. Quickly followed by “but everybody puts on their pants one leg at the time just like I do” and “if you and I have a mutual client, they’ll cancel you to come see me before they cancel me to go see you” and so I sucked it up and smiled and said, “I’m a hairstylist.” He smiled and said the obligatory, “oh, I should’ve known, just looking at your hair.” And the thought in my mind was “fool. I look like maw maw from the trailer park in this dang Texas humidity this morning.” (This portion of the chat should have absolutely been the first tipoff that he was a politician. But I digress)

Thank the good Lord above the conversation quickly changed to something else and the two of them were yucking it up once more. After 5 or 6 or 7 minutes of this, the gentleman said he needed to get on inside, he was speaking to a group of boy scouts this morning. “Awww,” we said. Or maybe that was just me that said it. I don’t know. I’m so confused and lost and in a dazed fog, I’m not even sure I know my name anymore. Then The Lawyer asked if we could get a photo with him. He, of course, was quite happy to, because again, that’s what old friends do. “Put your lovely wife in the middle,” he said. Then, y’all, I’d have done anything to have another camera on us. What ensued was nothing short of keystone cops trying to pose themselves. There’s just nothing like three old people trying to get themselves in a selfie when the ringleader is already selfie challenged. I could hardly breathe.

But we got it done. And it was adorable, because it was genuine. I look like CRAPOLA, but I don’t care, because the smiles on all three of our faces were real. My favorite kind of photos.

So The Lawyer’s old friend turned and went inside, and we turned and headed down the steps. I was sure to wait until the gentleman was out of earshot and I looked at The Lawyer and said, “who the hell was that?!?!”

I spent this entire conversation completely lost. The synaptic breakdowns finally had their own little nervous breakdowns in my brain and gave up. But did I mention how much fun it was?

The Lawyer looked at me like I had three eyeballs. “You really don’t know who that was?!?!” To which I replied, (perhaps with a little attitude and possibly a slight eye roll) “would I be asking you if I did?!??”

He huffed, spewed and spit a little, nearly choked, then said, “it was Rick Perry.” To which I replied, “who is that? He’s your old friend? How do you know him?”

I thought The Lawyer was going to leave me in Texas.

Y’all. We just had a hilarious conversation with the former governor of Texas, former Presidential candidate, former energy secretary, Rick Perry. And I had NO IDEA who he was.

My poor little synapses just imploded.

The Lawyer’s blood pressure went up.

I got out The Google.

Ohhhh, that guy. Yeah, I guess he looks vaguely familiar, though I don’t rightly necessarily remember his name. But this picture of him with dark hair from 2016, yeah I’ve seen him before. But not this guy we just talked to. Don’t know him from Adam.

Then I had the “whoa” moment.

This guy is pretty influential. He knows people. He’s “famous.” OH GOOD LORD I’M SO GLAD NOTHING IN THAT CONVERSATION LENT ITSELF TO ANYBODY REALIZING I DIDN’T KNOW WHO THE HECK HE WAS!!!

I’m still laughing at myself. You see, one of my favorite mantras is “you can’t laugh at other people unless you can laugh at yourself. And I like to laugh at other people, sooo……”

I lost count of the number of synaptic breakdowns that occured, but let’s revisit breakdown number two, as promised.

As I was struggling in my early morning stupor (ok, so it was more like 10 o’clock, but whatever) I was grasping for any and all pieces parts to connect and make anything make sense. But the more I tried, the worse it got, so I finally gave up. But not before the following thoughts occured.

Like I said, from the first words out of The Lawyer’s mouth toward this man, there seemed to be an old kindred spirit, so I was reaching a bit back in my history files to place him. Then I heard The Lawyer say, “Perry,” and here’s where my brain started its backfiring. I’m just glad no one could hear it out loud. You see, the only man with the last name Perry that I’m aware of and have ever met is a politician from Alachua. And we’re standing at a Capitol where politicians live; yeah, I know it’s Texas and not Florida, but still. Which would be a big “so what” except that The Lawyer also lived at one point in his life in Alachua, so maybe they met then, but I hope not because the one I know used to frequent the massage parlor in my building, so oh Lord I hope it’s not him, but wait, it’s not him because I have met him and know what he looks like and he doesn’t look like this man in front of me right now, but The Lawyer just said “Perry” so who else could it be, but it’s not, thank God, because I don’t want to have to play along with that Perry, but then who does that make this guy be, and good grief I need to stop this and pay attention in case somebody says something that makes more sense than this not making sense and now you see why you want to make me an appointment with my counselor.

I’m exhausting.

And still laughing.

I told The Lawyer all of this, with trepidation mind you. I’m wondering if he’s even remotely getting used to my “whatever this is that goes on in my head” ridiculosity. Probably not. I just remind him it’s part of my charm. He doesn’t even feign a half smile for me. Just makes me laugh all the more.

So there ya go. My brush with political royalty, and I didn’t even know it.

And I’m glad.

We were on equal footing. I didn’t know him. And he didn’t know me. What a great place to start. How would your conversations go with someone who was someone, but you didn’t know you “should” be intimidated? Bet they may go a little differently, huh? You should try it some time.

He was delightful. Watching my adorable husband have a lively conversation with this man about flying and such made every fiber of my heart smile. That someone who had somewhere to be, who didn’t know who we were but took five minutes to chew the fat with us, reminded me that strangers can be nice folk.

And we all put our pants on one leg at the time.