“You’re up early!”
I laugh, “Yeah, no kidding!”, as I try to get comfortable on the hard teak chair on our second floor balcony.
It’s 7:31AM PST on Cinco de Mayo, a cold and dreary Saturday morning by SoCal standards, and I am sitting outside so as not to disturb anyone else. I have just connected on a video chat with two dear friends from college (the first time around). I’ll call them Ruchi and Jena. I have known Ruchi since high school and we were on friendly terms back then, but we generally occupied different orbits. We didn’t realize we’d be attending the same university until we met at that fated freshman orientation. We would immediately become close friends, as comrades in combat often do. Jena transferred in from another school as Ruchi’s roommate some time later, and was a natural fit into our intimate world.
Jena and I moved in together after graduation, as we both found positions in New Jersey. After a long day of surveying available apartments, we settled on the last place we saw — a fourth-floor walk-up just outside the more desirable part of Hoboken. The apartment itself was cute and bright, but I suspect our decision was heavily influenced by the hotness factor of our realtor. Be that as it may, the apartment served us well that year as the launching point of many long, wild nights. Ruchi came to visit us, and we’d start off the evening — especially in the beginning — always toasting with a Malibu and pineapple juice cocktail.
It’s hard to believe we are fast approaching the twenty-five year anniversary of post-college life and those first Malibu & Pineapples, and we reflected on that during our call. It also just dawned on me that I have known Ruchi and Jena longer than I haven’t. Though our lives were so intertwined those early years, our paths eventually diverged. My life, especially, took a sudden detour when I was I was laid off from that first job after only nine months and I found myself desperately lost. The only thing I managed to do successfully in that time was develop one heck of a drinking problem.
The three of us, along with a few other friends, had already booked a trip to South Beach for that spring, and I went despite being freshly unemployed. For the sake of modesty, but mostly because I don’t remember a lot of it, I won’t mention the shenanigans I got into during that week. What is worth noting here, though, was what I now recognize to be an intervention — an awkward and painful confrontation about my irresponsible drinking. I was oblivious to the fact that not only was I diving headlong down the tubes, but I was potentially inviting danger to the rest of the group. The most vivid memory from that trip, one that I tried hard to forget — sitting on the rooftop deck of our Ocean Drive hotel, the look of grave concern and disappointment on Jena’s face juxtaposed against the startling azure sky and the midday Miami sun.
“I wouldn’t trade those Malibu and Pineapple days for anything,” said Ruchi.
I nodded in agreement, but my heart felt conflicted. It was one thing to celebrate the innocence of those first low-alcohol cocktails, mixed on our tiny kitchen counter, as we got gussied up to meet Jena’s new work friends. I can recall with amusement having my first ever Corona, in a dingy bar-slash-club on Hudson Street, and thinking “Jesus, this tastes like piss!” The flavor never improved, but with diligent effort, it sufficiently lubricated the wheels of inhibition and introversion.
It took a long time for me to take off the rose-colored glasses (or in my case, the beer goggles) regarding that era in my life. I used to be nostalgic for that magical year of firsts — first grown-up apartment, first grown-up paycheck, first shared joint with our new friends and waiting for the munchies to hit, then diving into the most delicious takeout from Sri Thai. Now, I can’t help but reflect how terrifying that was for me, the state I was in. I just didn’t know it back then. Or, more likely, I did know — and I had used alcohol to numb myself to it. Drinking became the answer, long after I had forgotten the question.
I suppose I would have a greater appreciation for the adventures we experienced if only I could remember them better. What I appreciate now is the present moment, on a video call with two good friends who have long stood the test of time and time zones. The three of us are now leading radically different lives, but we are bound by history, love and our common desires: to be healthy. To be happy. To be at peace.
So, on this Cinco de Mayo morning, we aren’t discussing Mexican inspired party plans involving margaritas for later in the day. We are discussing positive morning routines and fitting more yoga into our lives. (Ruchi and Jena were my most loyal students during my brief interlude as a pandemic-lockdown online yoga instructor.) Though I have forgotten all of the pose names in Sanskrit, I’ve recently been waking up early every morning to get at least a few minutes of Sun Salutations in. Ruchi says she’s increased her endurance for longer sessions and has managed to get her husband on the bandwagon, while Jena muses that she might have more time for yoga if she swapped out one of her four kirtan sessions.
What’s a kirtan, you ask?
I don’t really know either, but it involves singing and a fascinating musical instrument called a harmonium, which looks like the infant love child of an upright piano and an accordion. I fantasize about accompanying her performance of Shiva Shankara with my electric guitar one day.
But the first step: take my first guitar lesson in twenty years next Monday.
There are many other firsts on the horizon, and surely some of them will have to be endured rather than celebrated — first colonoscopy, first hot flash, first broken hip. There is tremendous beauty in experiencing joy as well as hardships, because how can you know one without the other? It’s been such a gift to have such good friends to share the journey with and for so long, and I have promised myself to be more intentional in nurturing my friendships moving forward.
And with a tall glass of water, I raise a toast to my dearest friends. Cheers.