and now, here are a few of my friends

These are some good buddies I've been bumming around with here in the desert: John You already know a little about him from what I've told you before. He's six-foot-four, thin as a rail, eats like a wolf, works at Best Buy, loves Scotch and cigars, and has girl problems out the wazoo. I could go into detail, but that would both violate his privacy and give you the impression that I don't like him, which would be patently untrue. He's done a few things that I really don't approve of, like refusing to go to Australia with me on the grounds of remaining devoted to his girlfriend (not to mention converting to Catholicism). Nevertheless, I consider John my best friend. He's funny, smart, brutally honest, violently profane, endlessly hospitable, and delightedly human. If I was Winston Churchill, I'd still be very fond of him. He has none of the virtues I dislike and all of the vices I admire. Chris Though two years younger than the rest of us, Chris, son of Apple Valley's former mayor and very politically-minded himself, is anything but a baby. He lost his cherry before the rest of us did, that's almost certain. He, too, likes Scotch and cigars, has gotten his pilot's license (which he never ceases to wave under my nose), works at Del Taco, is almost flat broke, drives a red Ford Mustang (and drives it like a maniac), has a most ribald sense of humor, was in the Army for a few months before a leg injury forced him to bow out, digs guns and weaponry, is a dyed-in-the-wool Republican (and a newly-minted atheist), and is about as modest as a rabid chimpanzee. Despite this (in many cases, because of it), I love the guy. He's awful fun to be around, and is always up for doing something, anything. Basel That's pronounced just like the English name, Basil. Basel is also skeletally tall and thin, has an aquiline nose, Arabian features (he's of Syrian descent), is Catholic, loves rap (especially Eminem), really knows how to fill out a hoodie, is bilingual, works in his father's liquor store, is an excellent bowler (compared to the rest of us), has about a million cousins, eats salad unashamedly, and is currently having sort of an early-life crisis. He quit school because he hated it, and is now in the process of figuring out what he wants to do instead. He's also a fun guy, genuine, and generally available for a party or a get-together. Last night, the four of us went out on the town to celebrate John's upcoming 23rd birthday. Chris and I met up at Albertson's beforehand and purchased our good buddy an early birthday present: a bottle of Jameson's Special Reserve, aged 12 years. Then we rendezvoused with John at Oasis Lanes and bowled a couple games. Basel beat us all out the first game, being the only one to break 100 (he got 105). He got 105 the second game, too...only Chris and John had warmed up by then and scored even higher. I got worse from Game 1 to Game 2. I scored 78 in the first game and 66 in the second. Then we adjourned to Buffalo Wild Wings over on Bear Valley Road, sat down at the bar, and had some drinks. We started out with a quartet of White Russians...we'd been quoting The Big Lebowski while we were bowling the second game. Then we moved into Leinenkugel's (B-Dubs is the only place in the whole town that has Leinie's on tap), and shots of Jack Daniels Single Barrel and Maker's Mark, and finished up with a Colorado Bulldog each (White Russians with Coke). In the meantime, we talked, jibed, japed, took over the jukebox with the Moody Blues and the Band and Joe Walsh and Warren Zevon, and quoted every funny TV show or Internet gag we knew. The bartender (his name was Adam, but we called him Gary; it's a Big Lebowski thing) must've thought we were a pretty sad lot. I can't explain why my bowling got worse over the course of the evening, even without the aid of liquor. Of course, I did have a lot on my mind right then. Seems like every time I get together with the old high school gang I can't help but wonder. I marvel at how much they haven't changed. They're still the same people, admittedly older, their faces more angular, the baby fat all gone, a tiny bit of real life in its place. Their voices are deeper, and they're a tad taller and broader. But their minds remain the same. They still laugh at the same jokes, frown at the same misfortunes, shrug at the same problems. All that's changed are their catchphrases. They're not going the same places they were when they were younger. That's changed, too. When we graduated from high school in 2004 (Chris in '06), our ambitions were a lot different than they are now. We were shooting for the stars. Basel was attending the University of California in San Diego. Chris went to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Arizona. John went to California State University in Stanislaus, and was originally trying for a chemical engineering degree. I went off to North Dakota State for zoology. None of that's the same now. I'm not really sure what happened. Maybe life intervened. Basel quit school. Chris spent $20,000 in one year at Embry-Riddle just to get his pilot's license, then joined the Army, hurt himself, and came back here, broke. John couldn't stand being stuck at CSU Stanislaus (in the middle of a dusty, one-horse town called Turlock), switched his major to English, went through some ugly break-ups, came down here to the local community college to knock off some general education requirements for cheap, and now has serious girl problems. And I, finding that I didn't get along with advanced chemistry, switched my major to journalism, graduated in three and a half years, job-searched for six months without luck, went to Korea out of desperation, came back, got fired from the local newspaper, and am now living with my parents and can't find a job. I wonder about three things when I get together with the old crowd: where our lives wound up going, how different our situation is from our original destination, and where things are going to go from here. I have no idea about the latter. None of us has been through any real trauma. We haven't even had difficult lives relative to how hard it's going for the rest of the world. We've got loving homes to go back to at the end of the day. Most of us have steady employment. We're not sad or depressed. It's more like we're disappointed. You know how it is. When you're young and bold, you reckon everything's going to be wine and roses for you no matter what happens. Then you actually start down the road and find out that, like Tolkien said, adventures aren't all pony rides in the May sunshine. Sometimes—often—there's frustration, and anger, and disappointment, and bitterness, and humiliation, and awkwardness, suffering, shame, misery, impatience, and stupidity. That's that little thing called life, I reckon.