In 1972, the second book in the Frog and Toad series, Frog and Toad Together, was published. It won the prestigious Newbery Honor for 1973. A delightful children's series about two friends, Frog and Toad, written by Arnold Lobel, Frog and Toad Together chronicles the escapades of the two friends, including a "scene" about eating too many cookies, which is a classic (to me) in children's literature. Perhaps it is because I, too, have eaten too many cookies at one time, or because eating is a natural happenstance when friends get together.
Think, for a moment, about the connection between friendship and eating. Communing together almost always involving eating, or at the very least, consuming some type of beverage, be it alcoholic or non-alcoholic. Friends share both themselves and their food.
Somehow, Arnold Lobel fully understood the power of friendship......... and the true pleasure that can be derived from eating cookies! The conversational interactions between Frog and Toad are so vested in reality that they make reality television look like the reality fraud it really is.
Thursday night and last night, Capt. SO and I had the pleasure of eating with and being with friends. This particular gathering of people has an casualness about it that immediately puts everyone at ease. There are no primadonnas or people working on their doctoral theses in nothingness. No one is trying to educate the others on every topic of conversation. Capt. SO and I are fortunate to have several circles of friends that are just like these. Just normal people having normal conversations with everyone able to both talk or listen when appropriate.
Within twenty-four hours, we friends will be separated for about thirty days, with each couple going on a path of differing direction from the others. As we toasted our meal together, with a combination of diet sodas, iced teas, ice water, water with no ice, and wine, we recognized it was the last time, for a while, that we could talk, laugh and eat with one another. Sort of a bittersweet time, rather like the season's end of Aqua RV-ing.
I went to sleep, with a smile on my face, thinking of Arnold Lobel, Frog and Toad. The only thing missing was cookie crumbs in the bedsheets.
Ancora imparo
