a drive.

Today is one of those gray muggy days that doesn't belong in October. Maybe May. Or the end of June. But it's just a tease when I am here, nearly a month into autumn, waiting for the change. 

At work today, I was in the opposite mood to help people. Kind of ironic, since that's a good portion of my job. But I didn't have it in me. I was looking at people with eyes of something close to disdain as they made their way to the counter. My mind got easily lost in the building of a turkey and swiss panini. The dishes received my full attention, and then some. But people. People were a pain. 

I went on a road trip this past weekend to visit old friends. The trip itself was lovely. Driving there was a bit of a drag, as I left on little sleep and a little too late, which made arriving the best part. Parking in Shaya's driveway was a big portion of the adventure, as the driveway itself could easily be confused with a mountain. The bottom of my faithful little red car was unintentionally scraped clean. The good news is that it was Shaya's birthday. Her twenty-sixth, and it was good to be there on the actual day...er...night. And, to make things about me, her birthday is always a reminder that I, too, will be that age soon. It's a bit sobering. We slept a lot. I took a three and a half hour nap on Friday. I also fell asleep in the middle of one of her stories. This is one of the reasons why we are still friends, the only friend I have kept close, regardless of the distance between us, since high school. I can fall asleep while she is talking to me, and she still likes me. We give each other grace to be, um, human. 

I made the trip from Searcy to Benton, a little community outside of Little Rock, on Saturday morning. Drive two was much better as it was daytime, and one hour as opposed to five, thought thirty minutes into it I got a call from friend #1 notifying me I had left the carrot cake intended for friend #2 in friend #1's refrigerator. I was venturing that way to see Amy, a good friend from college, that is a talented writer, a wife to Kyle, a great source of corny jokes and thoughtfulness, and soon to be, a mother to Owen. We had not spent much time together since college, and it was good to catch up, and good to see, in 3-D, what her life looks like now. 

And outside of the friendliness and catching up and driving around, it was good to just get away. I think that anytime we build roots, whether it be in Seattle or New York or a small town in Iowa, it's ever so easy to get into the rut where possibility is averted, and cast aside, to make room for routine and those things that are most familiar, and often, easiest. Just getting in the car and using directions and the highway system to get me somewhere far away reminds me of the possibilities this life holds. Going to small diners in small towns reminds me that people take risks on investments, and abandoning the mold of 8 to 5 is still done, by all kinds of people people in all kinds of places. 

And in honor of that, I want to say a few words about Frozen Delight, a heck of an establishment somewhere on the outskirts of Searcy Arkansas.  When I asked Shaya if there was anywhere to get ice cream, I had no idea that we were headed for such a wonderful little dive. My first impression was the aroma, a smell from my childhood...of all things fried. The sloping burnt orange booths were topped with the old fashioned plastic ketchup bottles, whose lids look like red witches hats. There were people scattered about, from all sections of life. College students were at the table to our right, and in the booth behind ours sat two couples somewhere near my parents age, enjoying the catfish special. We were there for frozen goodness, and since the ice cream offerings weren't on the wall menu, I walked around a few people in line to get one of the hand-held menus that were, of course, laminated on neon colored paper. I wasn't really thinking of my friends, but rather, of what kind of goodies I wanted in my mix, so I grabbed only one menu, for only me. The tall gray haired man in charge, who was wearing designer jeans and a dingy gray Frozen Delight t-shirt, noticed my carelessness and walked over to us with two other menus, handing them to the friends I had forgotten. In jest, he decided to offer us one of those lovely phrases I don't think I could ever get enough of...he let us know it's something his dad would have said, saying...in reference to my negligence with the menus, "Do those come like dead people? One to a box?". I was already in awe of my experience. This encounter put it over the top. 

Speaking of over the top, they put my ice cream in the cup quite like that. I had to lick the styrofoam sides right as she sat it on the table. I settled for snickers and banana fudge, and it was, most definitely and without question, a frozen delight.

My drive home was more of an evening delight, as I left the area just in time to catch the full spectrum of the sunset, on a breezy fall day, and still make it home before dark. I was into the music, and in my own head, and really, I couldn't think of a better way to spend my evening. I made it home to an old house, with two lovely roommates and all sorts of things to be thankful for. I was especially thankful for the chance to be reminded that we are all different, living in different environments making different choices, and that there isn't a right, a mold, a specific lined out plan to achieve a life of contentment. It's different for all of us, and I went to sleep last night thankful for the choices I have made, and thankful that, despite questions I face, confusions within, and those pesky uncontrollables, contentment abounds.