Jill is one of my favorite people. We met in the early 80’s at a conference on Promotions. At the time, we both worked in packaged goods marketing, she at Campbell’s and me at Gillette. I lived in Boston; she lived in Philadelphia. We bonded for the five or so days of the seminar, and then went back to our respective cities and didn’t keep in touch.
About 5 years later, Jill was moving to New York. She called me and we became fast friends. We both ended up working at CBS at the same time; our offices were next to each other. I still remember her in a pumpkin-colored chic Charivari pant suit, and using an Apple computer before anyone had one. Because we had TV’s in our office (it was CBS, after all), we would watch a lot of daytime programming. It was a good excuse to keep up-to-date with trash TV.
We laughed our way through endless project-update meetings. We attended every World Series Game in 1990, all without clients, including two we watched in Oakland California. We sat in court side seats at the US Open. We skied together in Vail, where one of us spent most of the time on the slopes and the other spent more time hanging out with a cutie from the mountain. We went to meetings in LA for the presentation of the new fall lineup. We arrived with tans, having stopped off on our way there (and planning a repeat stop-off on the way back) in Vail. When I said to Jill, “What should we say about our tans if anyone asks?,” Jill replied, “Just deny having one.” No one asked.
Our lives and interests are similar. We both are single mothers raising sons we adore. We both are (or in my case were) in the entertainment/media business. We both love movies and theater. And we both harbor (or at least once did) a wild streak.
Tonight we meet for dinner and a movie. We choose a restaurant whose sliders I love. Jill, who swims a mile a day, every day, is fit, petite and health conscious. So I’m surprised when she orders the two-salmon sliders-with fries option. She usually goes for the salad. Seeing her order the fries gives me the courage to order the three- slider option, but no fries (and a small salad instead). My three sliders are: crab, salmon, and kobe beef. As amazing as the meal is, I hardly notice it, as the conversation is far more sumptuous than the food. Dinner ends just as Jill begins to tell me a story that could have been the only story told all night.
We go to the movies and see a cute but forgettable comedy, Going the Distance. I come home with one thought, I must see Jill more often.
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