Читать книгу The Columns (Volume One) - Tracy Lorenz - Страница 12

By Tracy K. Lorenz

Okay, here’s a pop quiz: You’re taking a little twenty-five mile bike ride with your friends down the Hart – Montague trail. One guy gets a flat tire a hundred yards from a service station, one guy gets a flat tire in the middle of absolute frickin’ nowhere. One of these two has a spare inner-tube, guess which one.

If you guessed Dave “I’m prepared for anything and even calibrated my odometer by putting chalk lines on the road” Schaab had the spare inner tube near the service station (and had the tire changed like he was pitting at Talladega) you win! If you guessed Matt “POP! Ssssssssss” Bosma was the one stranded then you win twice! But it wasn’t Matt’s fault, he borrowed one of my bikes and I’ve never owned a spare tube in my life.

Which brings up an ethics question,; Matt was on my bike when the tire popped, who should stay with the bike and who should ride ten miles to get the truck to pick up the stranded rider? There was no discussion, Matt stayed, I rode, Matt walked to some mysterious party store hidden behind a bush, got some beer, and sat in the shade while the rest of us rode like maniacs to get back, get the truck, and rescue our stranded friend. Apparently Matt is significantly smarter than I.

But that’s the beauty of having life-long friends, you just do stuff and figure it all balances out over time.

And time is one of those concepts that seems to bend when you get together with people you’ve known since Little League. Anyone who happened to look down by the lake at night would’ve seen five middle aged men sitting around a fire listening to the Tigers game. But I was inside that circle and when I looked around I saw a kid who set the woods on fire and then ran home and pretended he was asleep. I saw the teenagers I rode around with when we bought our first crappy cars, and I saw the kids I spent hours with walking the dunes like Bedouins. There may be some gray hair and maybe a double chin or two but for some reason I can’t help but see the kid inside.

We’ve known each other so long that conversation is just a formality, it would really make things easier if we just numbered the stories. Matt could yell out “Three!” and everyone would laugh. Mark could yell out Fifteen!” and everyone would laugh. And then Glen could yell out “Twenty-two!” and no one would laugh because Glen can‘t tell a joke.

That was my weekend; bikes, kayaks, fishing poles, fire and guns. No fish died, no clay pigeons were injured, beer cans were melted in the fire and everyone returned safely from kayaking. There’s a certain peace that comes with familiarity, from having a touchstone, a “ghoul”, a place you can go where nothing bad has ever happened. What makes that place “that place” is the friends you choose, whether you’re eight years old or almost…retired.