Visiting With an Old Friend

Sorry for the long gap between posts... I'll say once again that life in 3D-Land is keeping me away from my virtual life. Oh wait. I guess I'm not sorry. I kind of enjoy my real life. Anyway...

During my trip to Florida, I had a chance to see an old friend. And when I say "old," I really mean that he's a long-standing friend, even though he's four or five years my senior.

When I was in the Marine Corps, almost 20 years ago, Adam and I were tighter than that glove on OJ Simpson's hand. Anyone who's been in the military can attest that friends from the service are as close as family. For me, Adam is a grand illustration of how these friendships stand the test of time. When we were in the Corps, we constantly hung out together. He was the best man at my first wedding, and he's my older daughter's godfather. With the passage of time, we've drifted apart to some extent, but even 20 years and 1500 miles fail to diminish my fondness for this guy.

Fast forward to the present. You know how the story goes... you get invested in your day-to-day living. The phone calls become less and less frequent. Your friendship gets reduced to occasional emails, and Christmas cards. (The cards are from him. I've never been good at sending Seasonal greetings.) But deep down, the friendship has never really faded. You think of the friend occasionally, and you honestly want to visit and catch up, but again, life doesn't allow it.

To put the time line in perspective, Adam left the Marine Corps in 1991, but he stayed in the area, so we kept in touch. My enlistment ended in 1992, and I moved back to Iowa in 1993. He decided to move back home in 1994 I believe, and Iowa was on his way back home, so I saw him then. We didn't see each other again until 2004, when he got married, and I saw him again in 2005, when I remarried.

Each time we saw one another, we spent the first few minutes catching up on what had happened since our last visit, but essentially, it was as if no time had passed... we always picked up where we left off. This, in my opinion, is one of the hallmarks of true friendship... a friendship that stands the test of time.

Well, it just so happens that Adam lives in Florida... a few hours south of Orlando. Fortunately, he was able to stop in Orlando, and we had a chance to catch up. In fact, we had an entire day! We met up mid-morning, where he joined my extended family-in-law for lunch, and agreed to tag along on our planned trip to Epcot. I must say, my family was awesome. Though I hadn't seen a lot of them for a long time -- and had met some of them for the first time -- everyone intuitively seemed to understand that catching up with Adam was very important to me. Adam and I tended to lag a little behind the main group, which gave us a chance to have some semi-private conversations, and reminisce without boring everyone else to tears.

We spent a LOT of time talking about days gone by, revisiting some of our favorite times together, but we both seemed to be firmly rooted in the here and now. We discussed how the Marine Corps really is a a brotherhood that never dies... something I think we both failed to thoroughly realize when we were on active duty. I think the highlight, for me, was when we visited Japan at Epcot.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Epcot, there's a feature called World Showcase that has highlights of various countries. Adam and I had both visited Okinawa during our enlistment, and we looked forward to seeing what Epcot had to offer. The one thing in Japan that I had looked most forward to seeing was an authentic Japanese cork carving. When I was in Okinawa, I was stunned by the detail of these Japanese handmade works of art. One of my regrets is that I never picked one up when I had the chance.

Anyway, while we were at the Japanese area of Epcot, I looked for these cork carvings, but none were to be found. I told Adam that I was a bit disappointed by this. He replied that he was thinking the same thing, and then proceeded to tell me that while he was in Okinawa, he had purchased a coffee table that was a Japanese cork carving with a glass top, He was studying it a few days before our visit, and noticed something that he'd never seen before, despite owning the table for over 20 years. We marveled at the detail of these spectacular works of art, and that cemented my impression that despite the passage of time, we were still in sync as if we'd been separated by days, not years.

We had a full day of catch-up. It was great. I was gratified that we got to visit. I know that it will once again be a long time before we see each other again, but I am thankful for the time we had.