This photo from 1987 captures a favorite memory as I closed out my student days at the University of North Carolina: our suite in Avery Dorm worked together to whip up a spaghetti dinner and we all gathered in the room I shared with Jimmy Randolph to fellowship over food. I'd been absent from the suite for much of the year, consumed by the duties I'd taken on as Residence Hall Association President, and found exceptional joy in simply spending time with these fantastic fellas in Suite 208-211. In the photo above, the three guys to the left moved on—and one is no longer with us—but (clockwise from me) Ronnie Hall, Galen Black, Jimmy Randoph, Arnold Miller, and I have stayed pretty close.
Held this time down at Arnold's place at Ocean Isle, it simply could not have been a more enjoyable weekend.
The last time we were all together was 2010, when I hosted them here at the Roediger House. That was itself a great weekend with food and fellowship as its focus.
It's been on my mind for quite a while to get the gang together again here but I kept not making it happen. Of course, COVID-19 pushed any timeframe off the tracks anyway, but I sure am glad that Arnold took the initiative and coordinated our rambunctious crew into an agreed-upon meetup these last few days.
I had time at the end of the week to make a few snackables to take along, including sugar cookies:
And zucchini bread (which I hadn't made since 2016):
And it would have been a grave error to overlook how delightful a big jar of sugar peanuts might prove to be:
The guys seemed to find their way to these snackables as the unfolding moments might have called for. And I was right there with them.
The Saturday night meal was pretty fantastic: perfectly-grilled ribeyes and piping hot baked potatoes. We stuffed ourselves.
Sunday morning, when you'd think we would be ready to all pack up and head home, showed instead that we are a most amiable crew who likes to talk, and to talk about things. Our final hours felt like a salon, deep and wide-ranging discussion of some of the current issues of the day, not all of us in lockstep but completely without contention.
Arnold helpfully documented us in action.
As they say, all good things must come to an end. By 2 pm we had wrapped up our talk time and committed to gather again much sooner than 13 years from now. It really could not have been a better time.
"Zucchini Bread," a recipe shared with me by Laura Thomas on August 23, 2000, in Woodstock, Virginia.
Based on "Mardi Gras Sugar Cookies," from Kelly of AmericanCupcakeAbroad.com. [Published 20 February 2012]
"Sugar Peanuts," long a staple of holiday gatherings in the Jones Family household. Recipe from my mother.
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