It’s March 23. It’s not a significant day, but the late days in March do remind me of my years in Minneapolis. March was the most difficult month of winter to endure because it was still cold and gray, and the streets were sullied with sooty slush and snow. It was a tough reality because for me, March meant vibrant pink azaleas and the chirps of spring and the smell of the season’s first cut grass. March meant open toed shoes, classes on the Lawn, and sunny days according to my internal clock. I was depressed every March that I lived in the Midwest. I never could shake my Virginia spring memories.
To battle the cold weather blues, I relied on my friends and the fun we would conjure up. We were all single then and wild and young and free. We worked downtown in the city’s tallest building and lived a life ruled more by impulse than prudence. 5:00 Fridays really started back then, in a cheesy, kitschy, dimly lit Chinese restaurant known for its greasy food that all tasted the same and its powerful drinks served in fishbowl size glasses perfect for sharing (though we never did). The drinks were treacly sweet and garnished in fabulous ways – paper umbrellas, fancy fruit sculptures, and sometimes fire! Every drink was adorned with a plastic cocktail monkey. Somehow we sent around the message to meet for drinks after work. We didn’t use email. Most people didn’t have a cell phone. IM meant nothing without an apostrophe. Yet, at 5:00 precisely, people from every department descended upon the red vinyl tilt-a-whirl booths at the Chinese restaurant.
And so our unwinding began.
We plopped down our heavy pleather computer bags, unbuttoned our jackets, and rolled up our sleeves. We clocked out, and the fun began at 5:00. Sometimes when life is particularly lacking in grace and I am lacking in resilience, I think back to those nights, those friends, those cocktails. I don’t have a fish bowl to serve up drinks but I do have a punch bowl, which is more fitting for my life today. Just because my life isn’t footloose and fancy free anymore doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate a good tacky drink and falling into a puddle of laughter with friends to wind down.
Come on over to my place, where 5:00 Fridays lives on.
Tacky Punch
1 large can pineapple juice
2 cups orange juice
2 cans of ginger ale
several drops of grenadine to get desired red color
1 bottle sparkling white wine
1/2 liter vodka
Pour all ingredients into a punch bowl. Stir. Garnish with sliced orange wheels. Pour over ice. Drink with a straw. Call a cab.