SEVEN ZERO

I hear it happens to everyone. Birthdays. Yes, I had one. Big one. Seven Zero.

Roman and BB threw me a surprise party. We called it a surprise party but it was never a secret. They rented the local VFW Hall. Veterans of Foreign Wars. There were pictures of old men on the walls. I now look like them.

A lot of local friends came, many are closer friends with Roman as he is far more sociable than I am. Marta was there. Marta is my friend from Guanajuato, Mexico. She is the wisest person I have ever met. She brought me a small black box that was beautifully wrapped and made me promise that no matter what happened in my life that I would never open it. Noman and his family showed up. The Cryptics, Hardy and Homer. Don, Bart and Margo had driven up from LA and brought Randy and Maurice. Maurice was sick from the drive. Bob had called me a week ago. He couldn't remember the date. Hein Skyped from Holland. Lots of emails from friends and family.

Someone had assembled some embarrassing film footage of me from my hippie days. We all laughed. Now my friends know what I look like naked, at least back then. I was kinda hot. I would have done me.

Randy had written me a poem which he read very seriously with great drama. I laughed, finally convulsing into tears. I will never know another person as well as I know Randy.

I finally had to step out into the colder night, a bit too drunk, a bit too full of memories. Roman soon found me. He is like a watch dog. We sat on a bench. He asked if this was good. "This is very good," I said. "Very very good."
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