Our Last Move

When we arrived in this city we hoped this would be our last move for a long time.
We were so weary of getting comfortable somewhere and then being asked to uproot yet again.
The last city we lived in before moving here didn't fit us well,
When we were offered this opportunity to have someone else pack us up and pay for the move we jumped on it.  So here we are.

As I said yesterday making friends in a new city isn't easy. 
Especially when both of you work from home and travel all week.
Adding to that fact that we were both older with no kids made this another degree or more harder. 

So we began joining.  Oh did we join.

We were just over 40 when we saw this group called 40 plus.
The brief description in the Community Magazine was about their meetings of food and liquor at the town hall where they planned trips and parties.
The article talked about their outings and get togethers at winerys, concerts etc.
We knew that the average age here at that time was 31 with child/children. 
So we thought that meant this club would offer more people closer to our age and maybe without babies and we'd find some new friends to play with.

I spoke to the woman on the phone and I thought she sounded a bit old.  I chalked this fact up to her being the only one who had the time to take on the chores of being the Big Kahuna of this group.  I know Rick and I traveled a great deal for work so our free time was limited to do such things.  She told me the time to be there and asked me to bring a dessert. Easy enough.

This time frame was very shortly after 9/11/01.
As I have mentioned it hit our community pretty hard here.
Because of this Rick and I hoped this wasn't the only talk at the big gathering.

We drove over to the town hall with the radio blaring to one of our favorite songs.
We pulled up front and turned off the car but continued to sing our little hearts out and laughing to a song that has some funny meaning to us. (George Thorogood, One Bourbon, One Scotch and One Beer)

As we sat there a very old woman got out of a car. 
Someone dropped her off at the front steps. 
She was small, hunched over, white hair and old.
She walked very timidly while carrying a plate of food. 
She could barely make the stairs. 
She lifted each leg as though she had weights at the end of her ankles. 
Rick turned to me and said, "I hope there are other groups meeting there." 
I laughed and hoped so too but instead I said, "Well she is over 40!"

The song was over so we turned off the radio and grabbed our dessert.
Rick wanted to help this woman in to the hall and proceeded to grab her arm and walk her in. Sure enough she was going where we were going.
As we walked in the door an elderly woman said hello and whipped my 13 x 9 pan out of my hands and it all was a blur. 
She yelled to us as she put the dish on the table, "There is a box of wine on the table, help yourself and then be seated."

OH NO! 
We looked around and not only were these people over 40 they were over 70.
It was a sea of white hair. 
There was an American flag waving in the corner that seemed enormous. 
Rick leaned in to me and said, "Can you grab the Lemon Lush off the table and get the hell out of here?" 
"I can't do that it's rude and I'm not leaving that pan"
"You can buy another pan....She scares me, she's like a mean old teacher and what's with the structure of this?"
"Military style no less. Dear God Rick what are we doing here?"

We sat down and we were deflated. 
Then Rick began to laugh, I mean laugh out loud and out of control. 
I kept hitting his arm to get him to settle down but now I'm laughing too and people are looking at us strangely. Which only made us laugh all the more.

I would have preferred that my attempt to make friends would end up being with people not my Grandmothers age.  But that didn't seem to be in the cards that night.
Some nice man in a walker who called himself the Mayor brought the room to order.
(order?  how was this a fun social evening? order? what is this?)

This nice man told us all to stand and to say the pledge of alliance.
At this point Rick and Peggy are attempting to stifle laughter so they don't think we were disrespectful but it wasn't working. 
I had to literally turn around and face another direction so that I did not see my husband or I was really going to lose it.

After our patriotic event they began to mingle. 
Slowly mingle because they don't do much quickly it appeared.
White hair floating around the room like smoke
My goodness this was an out of body experience.
We got ourselves a couple of glasses of wine.  BIG glasses of wine.
My wine snob of a hubby had to make a comment on the fact that it was box wine.
I told him to be glad it's not metamucil and to just drink it already so we can get the hell out of here. (I guess a cork and corkscrew may be difficult with arthritis)

The food was served and I was hoping the dessert would go quickly so I could grab my pan and get the hell out of here. Unfortunately everyone wanted the recipe.  I told them I would email it.  No emails. Oh those damn new fangled computers you know.

Then a younger couple came by and sat down by us and asked, "Do you both still work?"
My goodness how old do I look is what went through my head.
When I say younger couple I mean I would guess this couple was 63-66 years old which to me today isn't that old but these people acted it while not looking it.
We told them we did work and it stopped the conversation immediately.
It was uncomfortable so I began asking what they did and off they went.
It was grand kids this and grand kids that.
Oh boy this was going to be a long night. 

So there we were looking to move away from the baby crowd and we went from the young people having the babies directly to the old people watching the babies. 
Where are the people in the middle?  Was this The Twilight Zone?

We left shortly after our conversation with them.
Everyone was very nice but it wasn't our cup of tea. 
But to this day it makes us laugh every time we talk about it.

So we have given up.
Should it rain friends I'll let you know.

In the mean time it's a damn good thing I really like my husband!
He told me yesterday I probably really don't like him as much as I think - I'm just desperate for friends and company. 
He may be on to something.