Bryan and I left at midnight Sunday for New York. The plan: show up for dinner on Monday night to surprise Anthony on his 30th birthday. We had worked it out so that she and Scott would take Ant out to dinner, and when they got there, we’d be sitting at the table. The idea started months ago when Scott said we should do something big for the big day.

We stopped at a Crystal Inn about 5 AM and got some sleep– skeezy, skeezy sleep, but sleep. By 5 Am, quoting Team America and Aries Spears standup was the height of hilarity. And we played that movie game for like 4 hours.

We got to the city Monday about 4:15, in time to meet up with Kate and shower and change before heading down to the restaurant. They told us when we got there that they would not seat incomplete parties, but that we could hide in a dark corner of the bar until after Scott, Kate, and Ant were seated. The hostess was classic– as she was seating them at a table with five place settings, she told them that she would clear those other place settings out of the way. Scott had seen us at the bar when he arrived, but Kate wasn’t sure we’d arrived and admitted later to a little bit of panic. The look on Ant’s face when we walked over and sat down was classic.

So, dinner for the five of us, banana birthday cake at their apartment, and drinks at McManus was pretty low-key, but I think the surprise was enough of an event to make the birthday seem a little out-of-the-ordinary.

It’s wonderful to see your friends growing up and growing older (just a bit) with such grace and joy. Ant has built a wonderful life for himself in NYC and has a terrific partner to share it with. I hope he used his 30th birthday to contemplate how remarkable his life truly is. (As someone who is sickly happy, I can smell it on others.)

backdated to Monday when I had the chance to post