Two Weekends in March
Beer crawls and life affirmations
For a lady who doesn't even drink beer, I went on a lot of bar crawls in March!
One came at the end of the month, when Jeff and I spent a weekend with our 21yo daughter and her gaggle of wonderful friends at college. These people were so kind, so pleasant, and so genuine. As an admirer of quality relationships, I was beaming with pride and happiness for my baby to have such a community in her life. She threw a dinner party while we were in town to get everyone together to meet her parents because we don't get to that side of the country very often.
We spent our first day eating waffles and breakfast burritos at the amazing farmer's market, then touring the campus with so many gorgeous trees in full bloom. I hadn't seen a dogwood tree in bloom since I was a kid growing up in the south.
On Saturday night, we were caught up in a Banana Bar Crawl wherein hundreds of college students wore cheap, paper banana costumes out in public and waited in lines to get into sticky, crowded, loud bars. Here's a video to prove it.
If there's one thing these college students excel at, it's outfits!
As entertaining and fun as it was, Jeff and I didn't last long in that environment, and headed back to our AirBnB early to let the kids continue crawling. On Sunday I slept until 11.
Earlier in the month I went to a 51st birthday party in which 14 ladies dressed as Helen Roper from Three's Company (remember her?) and went on a St Patrick's Day beer crawl in Camarillo. Did I mention that I don't even drink beer! See what a spunky, go-with-the-flow party-goer I am?
Unlike at the banana crawl, ours was the only group in costume. Walking around in public dressed in kaftans and auburn, curly wigs attracted more positive attention than any of us had received in many years. Singers in the live bands along the route would shout encouragement to us on their microphones. About a hundred strangers requested photos with the group throughout the day. Others surreptitiously filmed us walking by. A reporter took down some of our names and took photos for her piece in the local paper.
Our demographic is typically ignored in public, we are the invisible moms. Men our age look straight past us to our daughters (gross). But not on that day! We went into one bar with a live rock band and when the Mrs. Ropers hit the dance floor, the guys on stage and on the dance floor were almost giggling with happiness. But, the younger women who had command of the place before we arrived were not having it! The attention was diverted from them and they turned on us! Two Mrs. Ropers got hip-checked. It was like that scene in "Fried Green Tomatoes" with Cathy Bates in the parking lot. "Face it, ladies, we're younger and faster!"
Dressing up as Mrs. Roper was definitely a Tawanda experience. Highly recommend. Many discussions were had during the day wondering how to take the show on the road in order to spread joy and happiness (and drink free beer) all around the country. Our presence was much appreciated and celebrated, which is always a nice feeling. What the world needs now is love, love, love… and a good laugh!
Since those were the only two bar crawls I've participated in for about thirty years, I doubt I'll be going on another one any time soon.
People under 25 can drink and smoke and eat the chili at Waffle House and never take the stairs and still look as fresh as if they just stepped out of a cryo-chamber. Their skin looks like when you first open a jar of nutella. Smooth. Perfect. Tantalizing.
As life moves along the effects of our bad habits start to appear on our face, skin, and skeletal system like graffiti under a bridge. First it's cute, a few gray hairs and laugh lines. Then more graffiti goes on top. Then more and more until we are living in a nursing home with four different professionals changing our diapers on any given day.
But regardless of how we look and feel, what we carry as we age is what makes us, the Mrs. Ropers, interesting and wonderful. We have endured hardships and worry beyond anything I would’ve imagined in college.
Life is hard and gets harder, is what I'm saying. And it was nice to be with college students for whom the most meaningful decision they make in a day is where to study for a big test.
All of our experiences make us more interesting, give us perspective, and hopefully help us not to fight or freak out as often as we used to; not to sweat the things we feel we’ve missed out on, because we can still go out and dress up and make friends. But if it’s alright with you, maybe we’ll just do those things earlier in the day, okay?
"There are always more french fries in the bag, hungry friends." --me
"I don't have to worry about this. I can figure out what to do about it, or release the thought." --Ekhart Tolle
(Easy for you to say, Eckart! You have Oprah on speed dial!)
Jeff and I are really enjoying a new show: Starstruck on HBO Max. A love story about a charming 28yo Australian woman living in London and trying to be an adult.
We also saw a great movie in the theater: The Ballad of Wallis Island which is a slow, British movie with a big heart containing nothing remotely offensive.
I'm reading "The Covenant of Water" which is 700 pages long and I'm only telling you that in order to feel superior and smart, because why else would I read such a long book? Anyway, it's also wonderful and poetic, informative and heartwarming. You probably read it when Oprah chose it for her book club in May 2023.
This newsletter is (apparently) brought to you by Oprah, and by this great album recommended by my friend, Carvell, whose newsletter is a work of art. Enjoy!
Thanks for reading, and cheers!
Shannon <3