Italian Night

Here is a photo I found of the famous Italian Nights that Bob and I would host when we lived in Broad Ripple, Indianapolis. The whole crew lived a bike ride away and we were always together. So on Italian Night, we would get the dear friends together, cram us all into our teeny-little-crappy-rental, pull out the cheap wine, and oohhhh the good times we would have.

We would spend the whole day cooking up an Italian feast, Jon and Ames would come early with extra chairs and plates, hang the lights and light the candles, everyone would walk over ... and making memories would begin. The whole house was loud and full of life. We all squeezed around the long table and every few minutes someone would raise their glass and make a fabulous toast. After dinner, off came the shoes, we would head down to the basement, crank the stereo and dance for hours on end. I can't even explain the magical and beautiful times we would have. It was perfect. I miss it.

During those special days, I was far from my Sydney home, the music industry wasn't giving us much work, I was working part time at a job I hated, and we didn't have much money. Basically we had a little bit of faith, friends we didn't deserve ... and pasta. The effort we would all put into making our Italian Nights something special and unforgettable have made those days some of the best of my life so far.

I think life is about that - making something extraordinary happen in the day to day with what you have in your hand. And I think no matter how hard it all gets sometimes, no matter how messy you find your life, heart, family, finances, soul (or all of the above) we must still always believe in something bigger than ourselves, cook good food, eat pasta, be with friends who are like family (you know - those sacred ones who make you feel like you make the world a bit better by existing) and keep having dance parties in the basement in the dark with fairy lights on.

I think things like this make life a little bit less hard.