"Seemed, huh? You going to be moving back, then? Quitting?"
"Not anytime soon. How's Ottawa?"
"Ottawa? It's beautiful this time of year. Alphie and Enoch and I were going to go to the trailer for the weekend, in Calabogie. You could drive up and meet us. Swim, hike. We've built a sweatlodge near the dock; you and Alphie could bake up together."
"Wow," Art said, wishing he had Audie's gift for changing the subject. "Sounds great. But. Well, you know. Gotta catch up with friends here in Toronto. It's been a while, you know. Well." The image of sharing a smoke-filled dome with Alphie's naked, cross-legged, sweat-slimed paunch had seared itself across his waking mind.
"No? Geez. Too bad. I'd really hoped that we could reconnect, you and me and Alphie. We really should spend some more time together, keep connected, you know?"
"Well," Art said. "Sure. Yes." Relations or no, Audie and Alphie were basically strangers to him, and it was beyond him why Audie thought they should be spending time together, but there it was. *Reconnect, keep connected.* Hippies. "We should. Next time I'm in Canada, for sure, we'll get together, I'll come to Ottawa. Maybe Christmas. Skating on the canal, OK?"
"Very good," Audie said. "I'll pencil you in for Christmas week. Here, I'll send you the wish lists for Alphie and Enoch and me, so you'll know what to get."
Xmas wishlists in July. Organized hippies! What planet did his cousins grow up on, anyway?
"Thanks, Audie. I'll put together a wishlist and pass it along to you soon, OK?"
His bladder nagged at him. "I gotta run now, all right?"
"Great. Listen, Art, it's been, well, great to talk to you again. It really makes me feel whole to connect with you. Don't be a stranger, all right?"