It's 1993 and I'm turning 50. Pat and Kerin Lewis threw me a stellar birthday party, too. But wait. That's wrong. They did throw me a stellar birthday party, but it was also a New Year's Eve party AND a wedding anniversary party.
You see, Pat and Kerin had met at the Blue Moon Tavern on New Year's Eve and a year later they were married in the University Universalist Church of which Pat was janitor. I can attest to this. I attended. Not that either one of them were members. It happened that Pat had scored a job as church janitor and maintenance man, and lo and behold the job came with a tidy little brick house, which was just large enough to hold the several galas that the Lewis's held each year. One big one on Pat's Christmas Eve birthday, when Kerin served us all his favorite prime rib and another one on their wedding anniversary.
But something happened on 1992's New Year's Eve - a family emergency, which one of them will no doubt remind me of when reading this. And as luck would have it, one of their faithful friends had a decimal birthday approaching the following Valentine's Day. So here we all are again. And when I say all, I don't think that little house held as many people as my back yard would in years to come, but when I say you couldn't swing a dead cat - not that you'd want to - well, let's just say the Moon didn't do much business on party night until we all decamped there just before midnight. On New Year's Eve, anyway.
Pat Lewis is one of the dearest men alive. He took any job available wherever Kerin's job took her - one year to Juneau, Alaska - but there came a time when, living near Olympia, life gave him a chance to follow in the footsteps of the likes of Abraham Lincoln. He read for the law, and is now a practicing attorney. Kerin, meanwhile, has become a prize-winning chef. And it's been about 30 years since that party. Yeah. They're still together.
So here are Pat and I doing the Holiday Rag. What adventures we have had with each other and our friends. What merriment! Memories that warm my heart forever.