Many nights when I’m trying to fall asleep, my thoughts wander. They go from one pretty general topic, to another, to another, until I end up with some completely random memory totally unrelated to the first topic.

A few nights ago, I was thinking about Christmas gifts. Somehow, I thought about the Sock ‘em Boppers (inflatable ottoman-shaped things that you put on the end of your hands and use to hit other people) that Matt (a childhood friend, not my husband) and I got each other for Christmas one year. I think his popped soon after he unwrapped the gift, because he was playing with them with his relatives. I have no idea what happened to mine, but it’s not as fun to play with them unless the person you’re hitting also has them. Otherwise, you feel like a mean ogre, because getting hit by the Sock ‘em Boppers isn’t completely painless.

And so because I thought of that gift from Matt, my mind led me to another gift from Matt, probably from late high school or maybe even early college years. A little background first: I don’t know how this got started, but over time, Matt and I made fun of each other for eating poo (not like either of us really does it, obviously…). From that, we created something called Joe and Jane’s Journal, an actual paper booklet with little bathroom humor cartoons about a boy and a girl who ate poo. I’m sort of embarrassed to say (but not really) that all this took place when I was old enough to know this was immature.

So one year for Christmas, I got Matt a keychain of a toilet that made flushing sounds when you pushed its handle. Coincidentally, Matt got me the same keychain, except he took it a step further. He had melted chocolate and placed it at the bottom of the toilet. Nice touch.

And THEN, from there, I thought about how Matt, another friend (Jon) and I used to hang out on Friday nights after our church group. We’d either go out to eat or go to either Matt’s or my parents’ house and fry up french fries or things like that to eat. We talked about opening up a diner called Farters and serving fried foods. A few times, on the way to Matt’s house, we drove by a house on the corner where a lot of racer boys hung out, and threw ketchup packets and containers of McDonald’s nugget sauce at the cars–while the guys were hanging out by their cars. (Horrible, I know! At that point in my life, I guess I didn’t have much of a conscience. Nowadays, I don’t even like cutting in line, even if someone has been holding my spot.) I guess my distaste for racer boys goes back that far…and, ironically, I married someone who likes tinkering with his car, lowering it, changing the lights, making it sound loud and annoying. Ugh.

As I reminisced about hanging out with Matt and Jon, I was reminded of how fun it was to look forward to the end of the week when I knew I’d be able to act silly and immature. After a week of going to school or work, it was refreshing to not have to worry about anything of value or seriousness. Leave that for the weekdays–my weekend had arrived! Over the years, though, it seems like those moments of letting go and being a little immature are fewer and fewer. The adult responsibilities kick in, and you just want to veg at home once the weekend comes. I miss having more energy to stay up late and act silly. I think that’s why I still value moments that remind me of those days…like when ET and Wayne visited, and we went out late for boba, or when the Greenes, Matt and I went to the midnight start of Black Friday at Alderwood Mall.

I know the “good ol’ days” cannot last forever, but I don’t think there’s any harm in getting a little weird and silly with those few friends who can resurrect the fun that we enjoyed in the past. Hopefully being home for Christmas will be a good time for that…

(Hmm…I just noticed the times on my blog are one hour ahead of local time. I’ll have to change that…)