If You Give a Mouse a Fribble...

Friendly's and Fribbles. Oh my gosh, the memories that conjures up inside my head. But when I think about Fribbles (mine were vanilla), I can't help but see the small squared sandwich, the hamburger too. That burger, to me, was something to die for with it's slightly red middle encased in a warm grilled cheese. Who thought of that anyhow? Marrying my two faves: the grilled cheese and the burger in one little warm house. Yum.

Today...MacDonald reigns. And honestly, it did back then when it was just emerging too. We had no burger joints, no shakes, there really was no fast food. It was all slow and freshly prepared and without a doubt much better for you. But then Friendly's came along, and the high school crowd jumped right in. Friendly's had booths, and you could linger over a shake, and that was exactly what we needed back then.

I think about all the high school dances and our trips to Friendly's and the Knotty Pine (Diner) too, and my friends, Debbie and Diane talking late into the night. I remember recapping the evening and almost never wanting to go home. I think about our mini-skirts and boots and our bell bottomed blue jeans, the music, the strobe lights and how giggly and fancy-free we were. In one short year, we'd be off at college and what an enormous shift that would bring.

The point of it all, though, for me as a writer, is the transition of thought to idea, of idea to emotion, of emotion to time travel and how the clear and authentic details resonnate in me. Emotion drives scenes, but details live in the underlayers beneath. Drilling for those strong, authentic details and tapping into the emotions that live there is always the hardest part for me!

I guess the lesson here, lies in the Fribble...not just any milkshake, because mine had a very wide straw. It was frothy and smooth with just the barest lump of vanilla cream (icemilk actually, I think). That Fribble, in its wide clear glass sat on the table...waiting between many long sips, while Deb and Diane and I pieced together all those moments of our life. And once that long, laughable slurp was taken, once we'd picked up our keys and headed home, we'd forged a formidable alliance that no boy, no other group of gossippy girls would ever want to deal with!