The Holiday Inn in downtown Bend has these nice banquet rooms that people rent out for weddings or baptisms or reunions or whatever else they want to celebrate with their families. On Saturday mornings, I put on one of my work suits and head over to see what they’ve got going on. It’s really easy to figure out because there are these signs they put up in the lobby telling you who and what is going on in each of the banquet rooms. One week it might be the Yomimuri Family Reunion and Nathan’s Bar Mitzvah, the next week it’s Jimmy Kerry’s 40th Birthday Bash and a pancake breakfast from the Rotary Club. I like to think of it like Banquet Hall Roulette and I look forward to it all week – especially the Bar Mitzvahs. Those are a gas.
It’s amazing how just being in a room full of happy people can really rub off on you. When I leave the gatherings, or get kicked out as the case may be, I feel giddy. I start smiling like I’m a squirrel at a baseball game where the peanut vendor trips on one of the steps in the aisle and drops all of his peanut bags on the ground. I figure things are going pretty good in life if you can feel like that squirrel.
