Okay, I just finished writing an email to a friend and it made me smile, like it usually does when I signed off. Here comes some random memories…
Years ago when I was President of Wildwood Zoological Society, I was working with the Parks & Recreation Director to get things moving along on the bear exhibit. I think I emailed him on Friday’s just as a reminder that we needed to make next steps. I even dropped off a framed photo of the grizzly bear, Ms Grizz, to have on his desk as an added reminder. I’m sure I annoyed him… I should ask him that. Anyways, he retired just before the exhibit had it’s grand opening. In 2018 I bought a duplex and realized from his donations to the zoo that he was just down the road from me. So I had sent him a holiday card. We emailed once in a while, saw each other while out on the walking trail. Then Covid hit, March of 2020. I had emailed him to check in and let him and his wife know that I was available if they needed anything. His wife was battling cancer so the concern of covid was big. We started emailing more often and after a while they’d have me over outside to hang out. We became covid buddies. I’m also his fire buddy, his city update buddy, and political buddy… his wife enjoys when I stop by so she doesn’t have to deal with campfire or politics, ha. At some point the Hamilton movie came out on Disney+ and we had talked about it. One time after watching it, I had emailed him and randomly ended the email with “P.Nik” like Hamilton and Burr did in letters in the musical “A.Hamm” & “A.Burr”. That’s been our sign off ever since.
Just a reminder to smile at the little things.
P.Nik