Friends Forever

Hooly
Happy Birthday to my friend Beth Gilhooly. Universally known as "Hooly." We met when I was knocked up with my third and she with her first. She's godmother to my third born child, Nora. Mother to Joe, Rory, Elinor and Molly. Wife to Russ Belk. (Classmate of Stevil, DeLaSalle, class of 1967.) School Psychologist by day, gourmand, bon vivant by evening. The only one I know who heads to Keegan's Pub for a Guinness after working out in the gym.



Fearless and frickin' crazy.
How crazy, you ask? Well, we were just goofy enough to take a road trip to Arkansas with her four and two of mine in a 15-passenger van. This was before Game Boy and portable video players -- Kids get restless? Toss 'em some fruit snacks and keep going to the next rest area. Ask me about the Arkansas petting zoo sometime. Think "Deliverance" meets Animal Kingdom. Donkeys. Snakes. Puppies in need of deworming. A proprietor in need of dental work and possibly mental health intervention.
Many good times in the back yard in North East Minneapolis and many birthdays celebrated around their dinner table.


Countless hours spent at swimming pools watching the kids swim back and forth. Only Hooly and her kids persisted in that athletic endeavor. Hooly's been through it all with me. Birth, baptisms, standardized tests, school programs, confirmations, graduations, weddings, death, IQ tests (my kids are geniuses), my constant mental breakdowns. With eight children between us, we've experienced every permutation of child development and then some. And we've lived to tell many tales.



So, I wish my friend of 25 years a wonderful year. Schlanta!

Enjoying: Dry Red
Listening to: Pandora, my "Van the man" station.
Facing: a Saturday of tax preparation.