Lunch with the Boys

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Every once in a while the text will land in my phone.

“Who’s up for lunch?”

The text is started by another safety guy. Our schedules don’t always line up so that all of us can make it, but Christmas is a lighter work load.

We had six safety guys around the table.

We’ve all worked together for more than 30 years.

In that time we’ve found the best spots and I was the one who suggested our favorite Chinese place.

“Red Pepper!”

And it’s funny but whenever we have the get together my wife mentions:

“You had lunch with the girls?”

The conversation is free and easy.

The laughs come quickly when we reminisce about  something once of us said or did.

We don’t normally talk much about the bad incidents that we had to investigate. Every one of us has had the truly bad day.

There’s a professional courtesy that we have established through the years that allows us to ignore those stories.

It’s funny, but we all met back when we were just starting out in the business. The oldest of us was in their early 30’s…

…a lifetime of working together…

…and now it’s all about the retirement staring us in the face.

Weird.

But we didn’t discuss that much either.

I ate all the hot sauce that they brought to the table. Our Asian buddy ordered in his native language, and he busted my chops about the Yankees.

Lunch with the girls.

More than 30 years of it.

Hope there’s 30 more.


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