We've Got All Night

Adele

Photo by Lovise Mills

   We were at a dinner party, 5 of us at our neighbor Adele's house. We settled in around 6:00, eating appetizers and having drinks and waiting for dinner to be ready, meanwhile catching up, but also all of us getting to know one another. We had no other plans that evening, just a pleasant time with friends over fine food and drink on Adele's pleasant houseboat that’s filled with art - each piece created by a friend, each with a story behind it.
   At one point, early on, the oven timer interrupted the telling of a story and Adele, said, 'Well, we have all night'.  Not sure we ever got back to that story, but stories flowed - and that line - 'we've got all night' - seemed so easy and gentle and generous and magnanimous, much like the evening itself.
   No hurry. No agenda. This simple evening, this time, these friends, this pork tenderloin to pull out of the oven, this bottle of Dewar's to pour, and oh yes, the story behind the cutting board that looked like a fish, made by Roger, the cutting board a simple but engaging fish design - its surface smooth after all the bread and fruit and cheese and life so thinly sliced . . . we had all night.
   And when we don't then we don't. But we don't wait or worry or hurry that time to come. We give it the benefit - take out the doubt - just give it the benefit, the way we would like it to be given to us, which makes it easier to give to others - whom we have no say or sway over anyway. It's how we conduct ourselves, how we live - generously and freely, how we pour - loosely and with a smile, how we enjoy the company of others, and give & take and join the flow, the flow of the moment, the flow on the water, the flow of good company, enjoying the benefits, as we relax into now . . . in no hurry, with no doubt . . . because we've got all night.   

gb, 2013