Friends around a table

Tonight I spent an evening with old friends, from the days when
our group was a danger to civilized society. Well, a danger to
ourselves mainly, but society did register a few complaints. We
met at my friend Ed's childhood home, which looked just as I remembered
it. Not one of us had aged a day, or so we said. Course by the end
of the evening I had heard at least two conversations concerning
hair growing out of ears.

We talked about the old days, and our old cars, and the ditches
our old cars ended up in. I got misty eyed talking about la Bomba,
my old Ford Torino. (Starsky and Hutch's car, only in need of paint)
It was a heap when I bought it, and still a heap when
I sold it to Ed, and a heap when it ended up in a west virginia
ditch. But it always *looked* bad; you had to careful when you drove
la Bomba because it would draw police from miles around.

And a first.... tonight I sat for the first time on a couch that
Ed's mom had put a plastic cover on thirty years ago. She's in a
retirement home now so two days ago the covers came off. And you
know what? Those plastic covers really do work; the couch looked
brand new. Course, for a generation nobody dared sit on that couch
so it's hard to argue that it's life has been extended. It's sort of
been in hibernation. A couch deferred.