Good Friday

There is a question I have not asked myself for some time. It was one a friend of mine used to ask almost everytime we'd meet. "What was your meaning of life today?"

The answer could be anything from Spaghetti O's to pint night, just as long as you had one. It was mandatory. There might have even been an unspoken rule that if you failed to give an answer, the other automatically shot you between the eyes for not even being grateful enough to say beer.

But I don't recall why we stopped. Could it be because after I found the one I would marry my answer became a given? Or did we just get tired of looking for those trivial things that had a second of importance one day?

The question is simple and most people could give a glorious answer about the sun shining and birds chirping while God filled their lungs with air this morning. That's what you're supposed to say. This wasn't about birds and sunshine, this wasn't even about God. We wanted the answer to what made you not fly off the hinge and strangle a mime. Or why you didn't swerve into an embankment because you realized this world is unfit to raise a child.

I can't say I remember many answers I had, except one. "A cheeseburger from Maybe's." Believe me, if you ever had one, you'd understand. Those were damn tasty burgers and proven enough to get out of bed for, even with the harshest of hangovers. I can even remember one of his. "I finally saw the movie 'Swingers' tonight." At that time we were unaware how life would imitate art against that story-line.

I miss that question and the pondering it presented enough to write this and start asking it to myself again. So I ask, "Self, what was ..."
To which I reply, "Off work at noon, and paying for a fifth of Jameson's Irish at noon-thirty."

Your turn.