"Bobby, Bobby, Bobby," I answer tipping my beer towards him.
Trolley Joe and Johnny O mumble their own greetings.
Michelle the bartender laughingly shakes her head.
Dean, the overseer of the Pier, rides up in a Golf Cart, which is banned on the Pier.
Thus it begins.
Others wander in and out ... Whitley Reynolds ... Kenny Wade ... Ohio Bob ... O Johnny (not to be confused with Johnny O) ... Garrett ... even my son Jeremy ... and faces I recognize with names I don't recall.
It lasted for several years ... this gathering of friends on sunny days at the Pier jutting out on the Beach ... overlooking girls in bikinis, surf fishermen, Frisbee throwers and Volleyball players ... we stand there taking it all in ... drinking libations ... and cracking jokes.
"Hey Rev! You look great! Who's your mortician?"
Bobby was old school before there was a school.
Leaving him with Johnny O, I stroll to Trolley Joe who's silently praying to the ocean, grateful that he ... and his wife Barbara ... are still here at all.
Cancer danced with them but they still stand with us.
We clink our drinks without saying anything standing there in Holy Community in the Grand Cathedral that God built.
"Hey, Hey, Hey," Johnny O says, "it's all getting a little too serious here.""
"What'd he say?" Trolley Joe asks.
"I have no idea," I reply.
As the tornados of change ripped my life apart ... the "Bored Meeting" sustains me.
Judy O named it that after that after attending and concluding "You are boring."
Maybe.
But God we loved each other and the time together.
Johnny O and I are the only ones still alive ... well if you don't count Whitley Reynolds or Kenny Wade.
Around 11ish today there will be an empty spot because the "Bored Meeting" is a thing of the past but ... ah ... it was one Hell of a gift.
So here's to Bobby, Trolley Joe and Dean!
I miss you guys.
There's no doubt you're having fun raising in Hell in Heaven.
Raise some for us too!
