A Lifetime in 6 Hours

I've been spoiled. I've been thinking about 'the good 'ol days' when all I had to do was pick up the phone and voila, I'd have a coffee date, lunch date, walk date, doing laundry date or, just a hang around for the hell of it date with a good pal. It's funny how easy it was to take for granted. Life consisted of classes, work and hanging out. Even though I knew the classes would end, I never thought that the freedom to just hang out would go as well. It's not that I don't see folks. It's just that the freedom to just lay about and pick up the phone spur of the moment to arrange a meeting doesn't work out the way it used to. My closest friends no longer live in the same city as I do. Even if they did, the focus of my life--kids, partner, cats, home, work--takes up most of my 'free' time. When I have a moment removed from the above list, I crave aloneness more than company. A good book. A solitary walk. Still, thinking back to the many hours of banal yet stimulating conversations about everything and nothing, I find that I miss it. I wonder if I would have treated those times any differently had I known them to be so fleeting. I had the pleasure last year to spend 6 hours with a friend who now lives in a distant land. Memories and anecdotes seemed to flow effortlessly as we both caught up on our new lives and remembered our shared past. Funny. I used to spend 6 hours a day with this person at one point and didn't think twice. Did I take it for granted at the time? Yup. Funny how precious the last 6 hours were and how, in a mere 6 hours, a seeming lifetime was (re)lived.