A few years ago, my best friend in high school (Sue) called me for my birthday.... Actually, she calls me all the time on my birthday, but during our conversation on that particular day she mentioned that she had reconnected on Facebook with one of our friends from high school, Joey. As a sidenote here I should mention that I took Joey to a Sadie Hawkins dance in high school and he took me to Grad Night at Disneyland. We were buddies, someone I could have fun with and no romantic intentions or expectations on either side. Just a fun guy. I am not on FB, so she told me a little bit about him and said that he owned a restaurant named Coconut Joe's. I remember googling it and saw that it was in South Carolina and that it was pretty far from my daughter's house in North Carolina and then promptly forgot about it. Until last September.
As we planned the trip to Hilton Head, something triggered the thought that maybe Joey's restaurant was near that area. So I looked again on the internet and was dismayed to learn that his restaurant was near Charleston. Last April while visiting Allison, we had gone to Charleston! I had been close by and hadn't known to make the effort to check it out. I mentioned this to Mark and he said that we should call when we were driving down to Hilton Head and if Joey was at the restaurant, we would drive the extra time and go in to Charleston again.
I made the call and the young lady who answered the phone at the restaurant told me that he wasn't going to be in that day. In fact, since it was winter, he didn't come in to the restaurant very much. I had wanted to surprise him and just stroll in, but that wasn't going to work. So I told the young lady that I had gone to high school with Joe (because it apparently isn't Joey anymore!) and told her my name was Wanda and gave her my phone number. She asked if I wanted to give her a last name. I laughed and said that there was only one Wanda at my high school. (And in my mind I said, "if he doesn't remember Wanda, then he is dead to me!)
A couple of hours later I got a text from him, he was out of town, but we texted back and forth and he said he'd call me in a couple of days when he was back in town. Ultimately, we arranged meet for lunch in Beaufort with our spouses and my daughter and her family.
It was delightful to meet up again almost 44 years after we left high school. He and his lovely wife, Marti, have been married for 41 years. Mark and I have been married for 40 years and thought we got married young, but they were even younger! We filled each other in on what we'd been doing, about our children, where we had lived, etc. Amazingly, we both lived in Fremont at the same time, but only overlapping by about a year (1979-80?) and didn't know we were in the same town.
It was great to see Joe and Marti. They are wonderful people and have had struggles and triumphs throughout their lives and have weathered the storms. One thing Joe said that I've thought a lot about. We were discussing how young we were when we got married and he commented that it is good to marry young, when you have nothing because you grow together. You know what it is like to be poor and struggle, but you do it together. And you know that if you ever need to, you can be poor and struggle again and be successful, because you have done it before. (I'm sure he said it much better, but I'm paraphrasing!) He said that his daughter who is in her 30s is getting married (or recently got married?) and it was more like two corporations merging because both she and her husband are older and more established. It's more complicated financially.
After our lunch, we took some photos. And just for fun, I'm throwing in our photos from 44 years ago...
Joe and I
Mark, me, Marti, Joe
Joey & I at Sadie's
Joey & I at Grad Night
