French Kisses & Kismet

A rare convergence of celestial forces must be taking place. Last week, I foresaw a somewhat open weekend coming, Mom was willing and able to farm/dog/cat/parrot/fish/peacock sit, and our grandson had an upcoming soccer tournament in Spearfish, where our good friends live. So Ray and I, in as spontaneous a move as we make these days, decided to drive to the Black Hills for the weekend.

Friday’s drive across the state on I-90 west was blissfully uneventful. We ambled out late morning and rocked our way to the Hills by early evening, thanks to Ray’s 16K-song iPod. 

We ended up in Deadwood, where friends were playing music for an Adams House Museum benefit that night. So we hung out at the Deadwood Social Club, above the No. 10 Saloon. I got to sit in on a couple of songs (my gratitude to the boys for that much-needed Song Therapy), we passed bruschetta and artichoke dip, Wildman Ray sampled the French Kiss martini, and we caught up with more old friends.

The evening was yet another mystical confluence of kismet. February 18 is our anniversary (22 years), and we got to spend that Friday night of our anniversary month (1) with the minister who married us, (2) with one of the folks who sang at our wedding, (3) with Ray’s best man, (4) in the town where we had our preemptive honeymoon. AND, we will have a full moon on the 18th. Bam. Completely cosmic.

On Saturday, we lollygagged around Spearfish with our son and his family, where we also got to watch 2 of our grandson’s games in the SD Indoor Soccer Tournament. I’d made everyone “Official Fan Club” t-shirts with the poor kid’s name & photo on them because, well, if a grandma can’t totally embarrass an 11-year-old kid, who can? His team ended up winning their division championship, thanks to those good-luck shirts. Okay, the team’s talent, hard work and sportsmanship may have helped a little. But it was mostly the shirts.

We’re back home now. And IF the Universe is truly aligning in an unprecedented configuration designed to release me from daily burdens, honor our anniversary, and remind me that there is goodness in the world, then these to-do piles I ignored over the weekend will go up in a quick puff of magical smoke any minute now...