Our friendship was a renaissance. We were re-birthed as Kipp & Ellie, the positive formed from two double negatives. We merged our separate unhappiness heaps into one large shared pile.
Kipp became my confession box. Like the brushed face of a Filippo Lippi painting his features made me want to spit out all my secrets. He’d accept them and spin airy puns into the web and then sift out all seriousness. He barricaded himself in front of those secrets, those sins and those unfairness’s’ and laugh at them with me.
I was Kipp’s direct supervisor at a small liberal arts college. He was a student and I was a member of the staff. We were only a few years apart in age but I was light-years away from college life. They had meal cards and I had grocery lists. They had AIM and I had email. Daily I went home and looked up overheard phrases on Urban Dictionary–back when I thought a pearl necklace was a necklace made of rare gems.
Look it up. You’ll never be able to say “facial” again, either.
Happy Hour Friday was us at our finest. We never missed it.
Happy “Hour” turned into drinking and being drunk for several hours…or days. Which led to several hours of playing pool. We didn’t know how to play but became sulky at the bar if we did not socialize. A renegade gang of lez’s at the hole in the wall gay bar became our instructors. They were bad tempered but not mean and they didn’t make fun of our lack of billiard athleticism.
Kipp, being a meathead, would just punch the que ball in any direction in total disregard to the game. His theory was the momentum would guide it well. He was not good at aiming part. Just fire. Hit the balls as hard as you can and see what happens.
Kipp and I were the balls in life.
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