The Friendliest Place on Earth

My poor solitary nature is in tatters.

We’ve had to be SOCIAL! Aaaack. A very lovely neighbor across the street has made it her mission to introduce us to everyone in the area. This isn’t hard since everyone is so friendly. However, meeting everyone at once at a golf and country club is Waaayyyy more than a solitary, shy, meditative person like me can handle. As far as I can remember from that fateful and stormy night we met 12 blond and perky Karens and 10 hardy and hale Dennises. There were also a few suntanned and perky children, but mainly folks whose children have moved out on their own.

It was hot, it was dribbly and the girls kept wandering away into the deep end. My eyes were caught constantly by the glistening of sweat-drops as they formed on everyone’s faces and eventually swept down into a river at the base of the neck to disappear either into the shirt collar or down the cleavage of the human fountain from which they came. My own sweat glands were in over-drive, washing away the non-waterproof tinted sunscreen I had applied minutes before, making me look like I was actually melting.

The young woman with the task of filling drink and food orders for the club was looking bewildered to start with, and when faced with 10 people all on one ticket ordering from BOTH menus resorted to simply saying politely, “I’m sure the bartender or chef will know…,” to pretty much everything. This is where I realized that my education was not complete and I was introduced to an ‘Arnold Palmer’, a mix of lemonade and Iced tea. This mix was insanely popular when I was a kid, but we never knew its name. Dennis, the one who ordered it, said he thought it was a clubhouse thing, and that if you were at a pool, perhaps it could be called a ‘Mark Spitz’.

The General Manager of the club did pop by every once in while to make sure we were comfortable and enjoying the club, just in case we suddenly had the urge to join right then and there

By evening the air cooled down a bit and the Dennises and Jeanies mainly drifted off either home if they had children or to the huge motorcycle party/concert/bar that takes place each Friday night at a club downtown. (Who knew?) One marvelous couple we met were on their way down on their Harleys. Theirs is one name that sort of stuck with me because I haven’t heard many Polish names in the South. It was something like Orgsvensnvki but with more letters.

Eventually we headed home, showered and retired, my mind whirling with faces of tanned blond people and cups of ice water. I do know, though, that if we ever need an orthodontist, a chemical engineer, a cardiac surgeon, a chiropractor, or any of several other useful and interesting professions whose practitioners we met, I will have to look in the phonebook, because I will never remember who went with what.