A few weekends ago, Ari and I ventured up the road to North Carolina for a cozy bachelorette weekend. There were nine of us, all from different stages of Ari's schooling - except me, I'm just the neighbor girl. She had elementary-school friends, high-school friends, college friends and grad-school friends coming from a handful of different states to celebrate and breathe some fresh, mountain air together. Because Ari is a collection of interesting, perplexing, and inspiring characteristics, the gaggle of gals present that weekend felt like a carefully curated reserve of people you want in your corner. The smarts, the wit, the confidence. It was all there, bubbling up and overflowing from each lovely girl that loves my dear Ari. I felt loved for Ari.
We stayed in a family friend's lake house and cooked cozy meals, drank wine from a box, and mostly just told stories. The occupations of each attendee are as follows: family doctor, nurse, surgery tech, three landscape architects, teacher, stem-cell researcher .... and a florist. I spent much of my time that weekend pretending to know what they were talking about, completely astounded by their knowledge and memory of things they learned in school. I picked up on about two of fourteen or so references to American history. There was lots of icky medical jargin and remarks about assorted pharmaceuticals that I've never heard of but everyone else already knew with a comfortable familiarity. I suppose they had filed it all away properly when they heard about it in those real schools they went to. I looked up words on my phone when no one was around.
I told stories injected with accents and bathroom humor and when everyone filed up for bed and I got to share a room with Ari, I found myself feeling like the queen's jester, undeserving of the honor and unsure why she keeps me around.
When we got there Friday afternoon, there were four of us to keep each other company until everyone else arrived that night. Since we were all rotating being in charge of meals, we had each submitted a grocery list ahead of time that the four of us took on as an exciting Friday night challenge. We piled into a car and drove to the grocery store to shop for the weekend. One of the girls, the stem-cell researcher who lives in NYC, was blown away by the grocery store. It was notably large but I suppose when you only shop in city bogotá's it would seem especially grandiose. She wandered the overstocked aisles with her mouth open and would run up to us with excitement when they had some bizarre item she can never find back in the city. I liked watching her experience the grocery store. We filled a cart to the brim (it was embarrassing) and took wagers on how much three days of food for nine people was going to cost. Ari won. She can do anything.
We wheeled our cart up to the checkout line and sorely incensed the two high-school kids at the counter. The girl scanning the items shook her head side to side as she scanned and the bag boy wouldn't look at us but mumbled while he bagged. He also seemed annoyed and confused by the canvas grocery bags we asked him to use, insisting that some items needed to be in plastic bags and becoming disgruntled when Stem-cell would take things out of his bags and put them into our bags. "What's he not getting about this?"
Later we decided that the check-out girl and the bag-boy had some tension in their relationship, possibly a recent break-up, and we had a great time filling in the details of that dubious tale. We holed up in the house and made chili and corn bread while more gals trickled in, chatting and listening to tunes until bedtime.
On Saturday morning, Ari and a few brave souls jumped into the chilly lake for a polar plunge. I made Laurie Hon's breakfast casserole and it was the only dish that weekend that had no leftovers.
That afternoon we went for a hike in the hills and found lots of waterfalls, neat plants, and rock statues. It was damp and chilly so I enjoyed watching each girl and her own reaction to things. The landscapers were intrigued by fungi and mosses, the med-crew was cold, and the teacher was unexpectedly gung-ho about scrambling up slippery rocks for a better view.
We came home to hot showers, naps, cider, and more stories. I'd love to share some with you but they are unladylike tales: things detailing people's reasons for emergency room visits and embarrassing things that happen when you're unconscious in a surgery lab. There were also great tales from the college days that had us shrieking with a combination of disgust and hysterics and the neighbor came outside to see what was going on. These are the great things in the life that you'll always remember... or at least vaguely recall when your grandchild asks you what you did for your bachelorette party way back when.
"Well, we went to the mountains..."
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