The Masquerade

OMG! Yes, (again) I know it is not Thursday. For some reason I'm having some technical difficulties. I need to change something and it re-posted my Thursday post to today. Oh well...

It's Throwback Thursday!  If you participated please link up below in comments.





One day I hope to be able to introduce everyone to my BFF! (if she ever gets her blog going...)
We've been best friends for 26 years.  OMG!  I feel old.

Anyways, in our teen years we were practically joined at the hip. Well, come to think of it we still are.  We live 10 minutes from one another and talk to each other daily.  She's more like a sister actually.   Our experiences deserve a blog of it's own because we've got some doozies!

Image credit: ournightlife.com

Our favorite night club to go to back in the day was called "The Masquerade."  It is in Atlanta.  It is still around, but I have no idea if it is a "cool" place to hang out anymore.  It had 3 levels.  The bottom level was called "Hell" (full of live music), the middle was called "Purgatory" (bar, pool tables, cage dancers, fortune tellers, a little of everything), the top level was called Heaven (live DJ, dance music).

We were very care free.  (No responsibility, no worries)  We got all dolled up one night and drove out to Atlanta.  Once we got to The Masquerade, we realized it was too early to go inside! Had we forgotten to look at the clock before leaving the house?  Apparently so!  There were only about 20 cars in the parking lot.  No way we were going in yet... we had to make our grand entrance!
(Are you laughing yet?  Yes! We were typical teens and thought all eyes were on us! HA HA HA!)

We decided we would kill some time and drive around Atlanta.

So, we were cruisin'... windows down, sunroof open.  We heard what sounded like a live band.   That got our attention.  We tracked the live music down to a parking garage.   We parked the car and got out.  We walked towards the music and stumbled upon a party!  "Woo-hoo," we thought.  What a great way to kill some time!  Some people saw us approaching and were SUPER friendly!  They invited us in and offered us some refreshments.  "How nice!", we thought.

Once fully in the parking garage we realized that some people were dressed in tathered clothing.  Some people had clearly not taken a shower that day or maybe all week!  We continued walking around.  There was a table with refreshments, brown paper bags that had ready to eat meals in them.  We noticed a lady standing behind a table giving out clothes.  Some one approached us and told us we had made it just in time for a closing prayer.  We all gathered in a circle and held hands.  I don't remember exactly what the gentleman said while praying.  What I do remember is, the homeless man holding my hand, quietly crying during that prayer.

We walked back to our car and decided to go home.  After that experience, we were no longer in a "party" mood.

I think my friend and I grew up a little that day.  We left Atlanta that night thinking about more than just partying.

When my friend and I reminisce, we always get a good laugh about the night we "went to The Masquerade and ended up at a homeless outreach."
We are in no way laughing at the outreach program or the homeless.  We are very thankful for the eye opening experience we had that night.

We are however,  laughing at the fact that we just walked right into the event taking place like we knew what was going on!  I don't think it dawned on us until we were in the prayer circle praying!