The Kitchen Table

As we get deeper into spring little pockets of summer are now popping up kinda like it did today. When I take my morning walk on days like this I usually end up sweating to death; while in the evening time the gnats want to tote me away. But such as it is living here in the Deep South. Alone in my office writing this post reminds me of just how isolated we all can be. I mean there are hundreds of individuals around me in their homes and places of work. Yet when it comes to the actual number of people I come in physical contact with each day the number is usually less than five.

 I don't know if it's me or just the era in which I was raised, but I miss people. I miss shooting the shit with my friends over a bonfire drinking a cold one. Or simply driving down to a friend’s house for no other reason than to just go. What happened? Have our lives gotten so busy that a simple phone call eats up too much of our precious me time? The "gift" of social media seems to have driven us to a world of 140 character conversations and Facebook posts that are nothing more than rants our crazy uncles used to say. 

 I miss the how's it going or remember when conversations of my youth. It wasn't nothing when before or after supper we'd end up at my grandma's house sitting around the kitchen table drinking ice water chilled in an old milk jug in the icebox. Doing nothing but bullshittin' about nothing. Grandma wiping the sweat off her brow laughing at each other’s misfortunes while the big fan in the window pulled in hot air. 

 I know, I know romancing about “the good old days” is a moot point in this age of disrespect, anger, fear, and envy. So maybe it’s true I am getting too damn old. But at least for a time, I got to spend my days riding my bike everywhere. Meeting up with my friend at Spanky’s for lunch before the matinée or just sittin’ at the river and listening to the gators while shooting the breeze.

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