My Christmas Gift

I got a "Kiki" for Christmas. What is a Kiki?

When I was in high school, my best friend for the first several years was a girl named Wendy Katheryn Flanagan. Everyone called her Kiki. She lived in my neighborhood and we went to Arts Magnet High School at Booker T. Washington in Dallas, Texas. We were in the Theatre Cluster.

I don't remember Kiki ever having a sleepover at my house (mainly because my house was boring), but I do remember having sleepovers at Kiki's house and they were never boring! She was so cool and I was so not cool. She looked like Marilyn Monroe and I looked like The Beav. We were so different in appearance and yet we hung out together incessantly, 9th and 10th grades especially.

I received a note from Kiki via Facebook (she goes by 'Kate' now) and she said she was taking a cruise to Mazatlan and could we get together? Since one of Jim's and my rules are that we don't schedule meeting people anywhere because weather is a priority I wasn't sure if we could swing it. I told Kate that I would love to see her if it was possible. So, when we arrived in Mazatlan last week, I emailed Kate and told her we were here. As fate would have it, she would be arriving on the 26th of December and yes, we would be here.

I can not tell you how excited I was... this girl was so important to me as a teenager and yet I hadn't seen her in 25 years at least. We agreed to meet at Copa de Leche on the Olas Altas side of town... close to the cruise ships and close to where Hotspur was anchored.

It was wonderful to see Kate. Her 17 year old daughter, Marrina, was there... a beautiful girl inside and out! And Kate's husband Rodger is fantastic! Instead of running out of things to say, I could have talked to Kate and her family indefinitely. And it was not a lot of "Do you remember when..." stories. It was as if we were sitting on the school bus together 30 years ago and trying to catch up on all the important things that we needed to tell each other before the first period class bell rang. And though I knew in my head that a lot of time had passed, I was conversing with my dear friend who has the same laugh, the same hand gestures, the same smile, and the same hair flicking... it was as if a piece of the past had been magically superimposed onto the present. The re-connection was emotional.

Rodger treated us to lunch at Cueva de Leon, we took a bus to the Mercado, visited the Cathedral and ate donuts in the Square. Then we took a bus back to Hotspur and gave them a tour. It was one of the best days and one of the best Christmas gifts!