The Rolla Boys™-Chapter 1

The basis for causing me to reflect on my past and current good friendships, came out of my 20 year high school reunion in the summer of 1998. I was visiting with a group of old friends and class mates at the home of Kevin Starling (since this blog is open to the world, I'll change last names to protect the guilty) and someone commented that it was a shame 10 years had passed since the majority of us had seen each other. I made the observation that at the rate we were going, most of us would see one another 3 more times in our life time, assuming we all attended the next 3 class reunions and everyone reached life expectancy. Steve Smitts commented that we really needed to make an effort to get together at least once a year because, "Stuff was going to start happening"; meaning, people were going to start dying. Unfortunately he was right-we've since lost 3 class mates I'm aware of.
It was at that point that Steven Ray Moses (one of my oldest and dearest friends on the planet) and I agreed that it wouldn't do to see each other just once every 10 years or so, especially considering we only lived a couple of hours apart and we'd been good friends since the 4th grade. I realized how ridiculous it was that we'd gotten together only a handful of times since leaving our mutual home town 20 years ago to seek our individual fame and fortune.
As a result of that conversation, I now make the long and dangerous 2 hour trip to the back country of Muskogee, Oklahoma at least once a year or so to visit my good friend Steve. If I get there early enough, I always find him at home going through his morning ritual of reading the bible and drinking himself silly on "hotter than fried whale snot black coffee". We usually shoot the manure until noon before hitting his favorite local barbeque joint* for lunch and me returning home. This get together has now become a semi annual ritual, and through it I've come to the realization of how amazingly simple it is to create new memories with old friends!

In a future installment of The Rolla Boys™, I'll profile this old guy known far and wide in the day as...."Beaver".
*For the record, Steve's favorite barbeque joint is any barbeque joint that's open and has some food.