2001-10-16 - 1:56 a.m.

Yesterday, I have to say, for the most part, was a good day. Molly (friend from MSSM and this summer Molly, not ex-girlfriend Molly) had come up from school for break with her friends Jenny and Melodee. Before I go on, you may be surprised to know that I know I spelled Melodee's name right, I'm not sure about Jenny's. Anyway.

All I knew about the plans for yesterday was that Molly was going to show up some time "afternoon-ish." There were absolutely no fixed plans beyond that. I didn't even know who she was bringing with her until I was introduced to them.

When they came in, I was at the end of doing my dishes, and I had "Encino Man" playing in the living room. I was most impressed when Melodee, watching one scene, said "That's the Asian kid from 'The Goonies' and 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.' That was pretty much his lot in life, to grow up and be in 'Encino Man.'" It's been a long time since I talked to someone that would know that, or even be able to identify Sean Astin. Very nice to talk to another legitimate movie person again.

So then it was off to throw my laundry in the wash at the laundramat and go walking/shopping around Camden. Finally bought a birthday present for Marisa after much looking. Thought about getting her a t-shirt with a nautical flag on it that said "Juliette: I am on fire and have dangerous cargo on board," simply because it would make no sense at all, but decided against it. Hopefully she'll appreciate what I did get her. Not that I can put that on here yet, but I think she'll like it.

Then we went into a store called Planet. It's a very cool store that's excellent for browsing. We went into the games section and found a game (I forget what it was called) where you slide this handle thing back and two letters appear. We decided that we'd have to say the names of famous people with those initials.

N. C. Melodee: "Nancy Kerrigan!" Me: "I think 'Kerrigan' is spelled with a 'k.'" Melodee: "No, it's a C." I shrugged. I didn't know at the time.

C. P. Jenny: "Colin Powell!" Us: "Good one!" Her: "I don't even know who that is." I just blinked at her a few times and shook my head while Molly took care of the "What? You don't know who Colin Powell is?" part of the conversation.

T. P. Me: "Trey Parker!" Of course, I then had to explain who Trey Parker was.

E. D. Me: "Erectile Dysfunction!" Somewhere around this point, we stopped playing the game.

Next we went into the leather store, which is, as you might expect, a store full of leather things. As you might also expect, it smells very strongly of leather. Oddly enough, I noticed that made me want to chew on it all. I can't really explain it, but I just did. I wanted to chew things. Fortunately I didn't, as the things in the leather store were also rather expensive.

After that we piled into Molly's car and drove up to the top of Mt. Battie. We looked at the view overlooking Camden as the fog rolled in off the harbor.

Molly, Jenny, and Melodee climbed the castle turret-style World War I monument built at the top of the mountain for pictures and a better view. I stayed below to take pictures and to avoid the inevitable attack of fear brought on by being so high and unsupported.

Finally, after enjoying the view and going back down the mountain for some pizza, we started to drive towards Rockland. We weren't sure really what we were going to do, because around 6 PM on a Sunday, we knew there wasn't going to be a whole lot open. Melodee said, jokingly, I think, that we should go bowling. Now, whether she was joking or not should have been a moot point, as Molly and I, the two people who were even remotely familiar with the area, had no idea where to even *find* a bowling alley, even if we really wanted to. That was until about a minute later when we saw this sign:


We knew it was a sign. And not just a sign advertising 7 Up. A sign that we had to bowl. Right now.

And so, inside we went. I am proud to announce, though, that they didn't just sell 7 Up. Oh, no.

They sell Crush, too:

I got the strangest feeling when I walked into the bowling alley. I've never been in the alley before. I don't even remember noticing it before. But when I walked in, even though it was a rather uniquely designed bowling alley, I knew exactly what it was going to look like before I even looked around.

I know people are skeptical of me and these kind of things, but I'd been to that before alley in a dream. I realized it as I looked passed the jukebox into the arcade area. The floor of the arcade room was about two and a half feet lower than the floor of the bowling area, with a wide door and a few small stairs leading down to it. In the main area of the bowling alley, there were twelve lanes with brown trim. The first eight were cut off from the last four by a walkway into the back of the bowling alley for the employees. The first eight were for the league bowlers, and the rest were for the everyday customers.

What first solidified the idea that I'd been there before in a dream was the first thing I noticed in the arcade. The Tommy pinball machine. I've never seen one of these in real life. I mean, it's a given, because it's based on Tommy, that they exist and probably actually used to be fairly common. I knew this. But I've never actually *seen* one with my own eyes. I remembered one very distinctly in the dream I had. And I knew that if I went down the stairs and looked around the corner to the part of the room that you couldn't see where we were standing there were going to be four more lanes. I just knew it. I remembered it, despite never actually being there before.

What's more, I remembered that, instead of brown trim, like the main ones, these were going to be blue.

And as I walked around the corner, in kind of a disbelieving stupor as the girls went to put on their shoes, I saw them.

Four lanes, cut off by a wall from the main twelve, all with blue trim.

All the pictures I took yesterday, I just sincerely wish I could have gotten one of the thoughts in my head before I turned that corner. Just one.

Recovering from my stupor, we sat at the last of the main twelve lanes, and started bowling. We all had our times of failing miserably, though I failed the worst. I did *really* badly. I'd almost have to try to fail to do worse than I did. Actually, I figured out my technique and started doing much better toward the end. Unfortunately, that was less than two frames before we were going to be done playing, so I still came out last.

Then it was back to my house, after renting a movie, and we were to watch two. I still had "The Graduate" from when I rented it on Saturday and hadn't watched it yet, and I convinced everyone else that we should rent "Josie and the Pussycats," because even though I'd seen it before, nowhere near enough people who'd actually appreciate it, including all three of them, had seen it yet. And so we sat and laughed a LOT, since funny things always seem that much more funny with a group of people who all get it, too.

Then we sat and watched "The Graduate," discussing the finer points of the film, the random trivia about it, yelling at Simon and Garfunkel to stop singing "Dee dedee… deededeedeedeededeededeededeee.." and just sing the damned song already, and remembering the "Wayne's World II" and Simpsons parodies of the ending, and just in general had fun with the whole thing.

Finally, as the night ended, Jenny and Melodee sat in the living room having a good ol' time talking about, whatever, I don't really know, as Molly and I just talked about how things were going with me. I unloaded all the things about my life that have been getting to me lately, things I don't get to actually voice anywhere near enough. Feeling the support of someone actually holding my head for a moment, supporting me both with words and her hands, being there for me. That felt good. I don't get that enough, either. It feels really good to have friends with whom I can feel comfortable doing that. Even if they do live hundreds of miles away and only come around once in a very great while.

And so, following two good long hugs, Molly left and after a bit of hoping Sarah would come online, I went to bed, getting ready for another day of struggling with the stock market and pushing my way through health problems (which I know aren't caused by anthrax, don't worry, you don't have to tell me, I've told myself enough that enough) while I work, being reminded for the second weekend in a row that I have friends who care about my well-being and are really hoping for me to succeed.

And I'm reminded that I damned well better let myself succeed if I don't want to be forced to keep waiting months to get to see them again.