Afterglow 2008 - Day 7 Friday

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We spend a good amount of time at the campfire raging it at night. It's one of my favorite Afterglow hangouts, but I could totally live without all of the Redbook restrictions. Campfires don't have time limits or noise levels - campfires are all out balls to walls fun.

The same people come up to Afterglow every year, so you would think that in 20-some years that I've been coming up here I would take the time to learn everyone's names. Wrong. I know 5 of the people in this picture (cause they happen to be related to me or related to a family friend) but there are 2 kids here that I don't think I've ever seen before. It may be because people keep bringing up their randoms to Afterglow, but it may also be because kids grow up so damned fast that it's tough to recognize them from one year to the next. Or they could have wandered here from one of the other lakes. Whatever the case may be, the jerk in me didn't take the time to figure out who they were, and I have a feeling that some day being inconsiderate of others will come back to haunt me. But until that day comes, I will continue to be the insensitive jerk that doesn't work for me.

Judging by the full unopened beer in my hand, I would have to say that I am heading towards the beach to go swimming. I almost always take a cold drink with me down to the lake, because when you get out of the water, that cabin looks like it's a mile away.

Some things are unbelievably predictable. I could rattle off a long list of things but I won't bore you with those. Psych. Things such as I drink when I work on this website, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, how much work gets done on Fridays, the songs that a wedding band plays, the outcome of every romantic comedy, and so and so forth. You know that all that crap is going to happen, just like you know Brian and Kevin are going to sit on top of the high dive from the moment they enter the water. Some things just never change.

When I was walking back towards the cabin, I saw Dale standing out on the edge of the dock apparently deep in thought. Or he could just be staring out into the great unknown. Whatever it is he is doing, I do know that he picked a hell of a good place to do it.

If it weren't for Brian and Kevin, then I would be swimming alone all the time. Sure, a lot of the other kids join me out there, but I can always count on these two to go out in the water at any given moment. If there is anything valuable that I can take from the movie Heavyweights, it's the importance of the body system.