FLASHBACK

Spring has sprung. In the Hill Country, that means a frenzied round of festivals and fundraisers, and being forced to pick and choose amongst them when you really want to do it all. I had to work the first two days that John was here last week, and felt guilty for neglecting him. When he suggested that we go to Austin on Saturday for lunch and a movie, I immediately said "Sure, sounds fun!" without even checking the calendar. As we were crawling into bed that evening, the phone rang. It was Linda Wong, my best friend from high school, reminding me that she would be in Austin this weekend visiting her daughter at UT, so we made plans to meet up with her after the movie.

We went to see Leatherheads, with George Clooney and Renee Zellweger, then headed down to the Drag, to meet Linda in front of the University Co-op. We were looking for a coffee house or someplace where we could just hang out and visit for a while, and ended up wandering across the street to the Student Union building on the UT campus. It was kind of strange, walking past the information desk where I worked my entire senior year of college, then taking our tea out to the courtyard where I spent many an hour just hanging out with friends in the early 70's. Back when John and I brought our teen-aged kids here to tour the campus, we kept asking ourselves "Can it really be more than 30 years since we came to tour the campus ourselves? In a way, it seems like yesterday!" This time we were asking ourselves "Can it really be almost 20 years since we brought little 8 year old Alexis here, and started trying to turn her blood burnt orange?" (It didn't work. We even named our son Austin, for heavens sake, and where did he go? College Station!) Where does the time go?

John wandered off with his camera, and left Linda and I there to gab for a couple of hours, then finally came back when he got hungry. Linda checked in with her daughter who, as it turns out, had just finished eating lunch at 5:00, so we were able to whisk Linda off to dinner with us at Mandola Market. After Damian Mandola sold off his share of the Carraba's chain in order to move to the Hill Country, his first venture was to open Mandola Market. It is modeled after an old fashioned Italian neighborhood grocery and cafe, and serves many of the same yummy dishes that we ate at the Mandola Winery in Driftwood. In addition, it actually does have a grocery and deli section (where I picked up the prosciutto and mozzarella I mentioned before), as well as a bakery area and a gelato case. Afterwards we took Linda back to her daughter's condo (which would make a fabulous pied-a-terre for George and Linda, after Melanie graduates). What a lovely day!

When I finally did get around to checking my calendar, I realized that I had missed the herb society's plant sale, the annual pie social, the monthly Wimberly Wordsmiths' meeting, the Austin Food and Wine Festival, a photo exhibit and reception at Texas State, and the play Death Trap, which was being staged by the Wimberley Players. Oh well, you can't do it all, and I honestly don't see how anything could have been more pleasant than the day we actually had.