A Small Lesson Starring Lasagna

I miss our Mormon.

(JD, the lasagna and Jacque)

We live on the second and third floor of a three story house.  The bottom floor is split into two apartments.  On the right is where a rotating pair of Mormon missionaries live. (On the left is where the smoking* Goths make their home.)

The Mormon apartment has two windows on the street level.  One is plastered with photos of Jesus and Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt**. The other is situated right in front of the desk where the guys do their paperwork and studies.  

And when I noticed that, I got a little nervous.  I hate any sort of sales pitch.  I don't want help picking out my clothes in a boutique and I don't want pressure regarding religion. 

But, thanks to Megan, I never got the conversion hard sell (if there even was one). When she was visiting, we were wondering past the movie theater and one of their colleagues stopped us to chat. He was American, cheery and friendly, so of course we weren't going to be rude. But early into the conversation, Megan announced that she was all good on the religion front and I said that I was committed to my Protestantism. We added that I lived above some of his friends.

The next day, Jacque introduced himself (as Elder LastName from Denmark) and we were happy "hey" buddies afterward. When I waddled by, they would wave and Jacque would pop his head out and offer to carry my bags. When I would run into them in town, they would chat and ask for updates and still want to carry my bags.  

In the beginning, I was convinced that I was being (benevolently) stalked a bit. But eventually I realized that he and his fellow Mormon walkabout-er (JD from Utah) were not truly after my soul and Pickle's. (Though I suspect they wouldn't have turned down either.) 

They were just really nice guys.***

Along with their general cheer and helpfulness, they were fun to chat it up.  Jacque would tell me about how he was looking forward to being a capitalist once his two-years were over.  And JD mentioned how he missed snowboarding back home. 

When Elliot was born, they presented us with a lasagna.  When Jacque came up to deliver it, he told Husband a story about how when his mother had a baby, she really appreciated the dinners people dropped off.  So when I went into the hospital to have Elliot, they got the very best cook in their church to make dinner for us. 

And we ate it for days.****

When Elliot was just about three weeks old, there was a knock on the door.  It was kind of late, about 10pm.  I was crashed and exhausted, lying on the couch in my pajamas. 

Husband went to the door to see Jacque standing there.  He had gotten the order to head to Oslo the next day and wanted to say good-bye.  Because I was not dressed, I didn't go to the door.  And I missed him the next morning. 

And I've always regretted it a bit.  It wasn't the right move at all.  He had been a kind, cheery part of my day for months and I appreciated it.  I wish I had told him a last time and sent him good wishes on his way.

JD and his new roommate don't wave and they just watch as I stagger past with Elliot in a car seat and bags of groceries.  And as I type this on at noon on a Friday, the Goths have a their music cranked UP and my floor is quivering to some Middle Eastern-ska-wailing.

So, I've been thinking about good neighbors.  

Overall, I've been pretty lucky. 

In New York, I had dear Derek downstairs and the cigarello-smoking, black leather clad (down to his bikini, no joke) cowboy across the hall.  

In Atlanta, there was creepy downstairs Jodi, who was so icky that (almost) Husband and I spent more time at his house, contributing a bit to his becoming Husband sooner rather than later (thanks Jodi!). And there is dear Joan, Husband's next door neighbor.  We loved her and will stop by to see her when we are in town next month.

But overall, in any definition of the term, good neighbors are hard to come by...and wherever Jacque is now, as he finishes up his last months of Mormon walkabout, we wish him well.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

*By "smoking" I don't mean "model-like good-looks", I mean "suck on the unlit end of smoldering cigarettes directly underneath our open windows."

 **I know, I know.

***Also, I was giantly pregnant.

****If anyone you know ever has a baby, bring them food.  Trust.

Our first visit

As it's been well documented, Megan is my peep.  And I've been psyched about her popping over from New York for a visit...

What did we do all week, you wonder?

We burned fried chicken and then ate it anyway.

We had a night out...

(Husband flashes a gang sign while Erin plays it cool.)

(The slouch of my body is to distract from the fact that I am approximately the same width as both Megan and Kyrre.  Is it working?)

Then we got fancy to go to my baby shower. 

(My friend Omar went to India and brought me a lovely belt.  Because my waist has gone missing, now I am using it to wrap what I can.  Thanks, Omie.)

(Look at everyone.  How lucky am I?  More on this later.)

We visited with my sweet hunds.

(Milo and Lillie are blue because they just found out that Megan will not live with us forever.)

We took a driving tour of the area. Husband explained it all. 

Then for Megan's birthday, we all went to dinner. We gave her a scarf and lessons on the correct use of toothpicks, but only if you're in Stavanger, Norway or Colquitt, Georgia.  

(Don't try this at home, kids.) 

Megan's hitching

Megan and I have been friends since the very beginnings of graduate school.  (Carolyn Davis, who's wearing the blue dress and dark cardigan in middle row, posted this photo on Facebook and then was dear enough to send it to me so I could borrow it at a decent size.  We all look so young there!)

And since 2000, we've had adventures. 

Both of us have always had odd freelance schedules, so occasionally, on sunny weekdays, Coney Island was just the place to be...then we'd head up the boardwalk to dance all afternoon at Ruby's, the diviest bar on the beachs.... (trust me on this...It's loads more fun that it sounds and were some of the best afternoons ever, especially on days when the Cyclone was open for business.)

Then there was always Halloween.  On this particular year, Megan was a mermaid.  Jess was a pregnant housewife and I was Miss Reform School. 

And of course, the wettest and rainiest concert Bruce Springsteen ever played.  (Yes, we are on the very tip top row of the stadium...But it was our second concert that tour, we scalped the tickets that afternoon---for face value no less, gotta love Bruce fans in Jersey---- It was awesome---and the one concert out of the ten or so I've seen that Bruce played "Rosalita.") 

And there have been countless events in between.

...Sipping key lime martinis on Manhattan rooftops.

...Staying up the entire night before the movers came to finish the packing.  (We spent several hours in the smallest hours of dawn wandering the streets for discarded cardboard boxes. Who knew eight years in the same apartments could fill up so much space?) 

...Helping me make new friends in Atlanta when she came to visit shortly after I got settled into my new apartment.

While I sort of hate that we don't have more photos of the nights out and the parties and the afternoons wandering, they most likely would be full of incriminating evidence and compromising situations, many of which I just don't want to explain.

...At least not now.  I do have lots of notes and explicit permission to use the stories as I see fit. 

She's is the best kind of friend...Amusing, brilliant and best of all she shows up.  And I don't mean just arrives, but participates and is a good guest.  And By good guest, I mean, adds to the party and stores up good stores and observations to tell later.  

This is a key quality. 

So even though Husband was at a crucial time in his work and couldn't come with me, I headed to New York last week, for Megan and David's hitching.  It couldn't have been lovelier.  They got married in the back gardens of a castle.

There were parasols for the guest waiting outside, then loads of dancing, food and drinks.  I saw people I hadn't visited with since I left New York.  And even in the midst of all the activities, Megan and I visited a bit as well. 

She and David hired a celebrity silhouette artist to work the wedding.  (Yes these do exist.  The night before this guy ---who was second generation, using his father's scissors that had never been sharpened--- had flown in from Los Angeles where he was the entertainment at a movie premiere.) 

He snipped out two copies.  One for the guest to keep and another to be glued into their guest book with a note.  Because my family couldn't come, Megan told me to bring a photo for the artist to use.  
(Yep, that's an approximation of Sweet Lillie. I had a photo of Milo, too.  But then actual human guests walked up and got in line, so we decided to wait.  Then time ran out.  I hate that we don't have a full family, but oh well...)

Megan loved Lillie's so much that after we walked Adele, her puppy who is almost exactly Lillie's age, she sat down for a portrait as well.


David waited patiently standing by...

And then it was almost time to go. 

This Just In...

Megan is a "predator" for one of the big American television news outlets.

This means she produces, writes and edits stories. Then she sends them out and, according to the news needs of television stations around the country, they will be aired for the viewing pleasure of people in Topeka, Los Angeles and Atlanta.

This also means that she knows stuff.

And this is what just arrived in my "inbox" with the subject line "did you know this?"



I sure didn't.