Party Girl

I just got back from Maryland where I was on the ground for just 25 hours. I went to a party. It all started when Cool Guy said to me (in September when we were at a wedding reception) "Wouldn't it be great if you came to my company Christmas party? We'd have a good time and everyone could finally meet you and see what a fox you are." Well, how could I say no? Except that the party was on a Tuesday night---the middle of the school week. Well, I decided to throw caution to the wind and go anyway. I wrote two days of lesson plans (and you know teaching...it's twice as much work to tell someone else what to teach as it is to just be there and do it yourself.)

I left Vegas on the midnight red-eye, landed in DC at 7:00 A.M. , took the Metro out to the Southern Maryland stop and he picked me up and drove down to our place there. I slept for a few hours while he went over to the base and worked. Then we drove up to Baltimore, checked into the hotel, dressed and went to the party. I'd bought a really nifty red silk mandarin style jacket to wear over a black silk skirt and (in my quest to replace my jewelry) found some marcasite and garnet earrings to go with it. We had yummy hors d'oeuvres and chatting. We sat down for the salad and entrees (filet of beef with roasted vegetables) and chose creme brulee for dessert. It is a small company, about 25 people were there, and it is an interesting mix of young and old, Israeli and American, military vets (from both countries) yarmulkes, and male and female. A surprising number of wives are teachers from such a small sample of men. So there was fascinating conversation and, as the wine bottles emptied, hilarious and sometimes ribald, jokes. I had to get up the next morning after only five hours of sleep to get back to the airport and I landed back in the desert at 10:30 A.M. But my sense of time is very distorted after two nights of limited sleep and radical time zone shifts. I'll get some sleep tonight, because tomorrow, I'm back to my old job of just being a fourth grade teacher.

But--overall---was it worth it? Well, of course!! How often does an old lady get to fly first-class just to go to a party as eye-candy on the arm of a cute guy?