December 10, 2008

• I am glad to know you in my life…

  GROWING UP: I can’t remember you before I was three only because I can’t remember before then.  I remember us playing in the back yard and having a bug cemetery.  I remember the toy rollercoaster you tried to ride in my living room and your foot went through the wall…lol…Camping in your back yard and your mom checking to see if we were okay. Saturday nights when your dad would take the three of you and the three of us kids to the pizza bar and while we waited he would have a brew and order us all rootbeer.  I remember your older brother coming home from the war and me seeing the pig on the spigot and I was sick by it and wouldn’t’ eat it.  I remember our first kiss at four when our sisters told us to and then teased us unmercifully.  I remember you showing off in the pool and doing a “sailor dive” then not coming up and me screaming and your mom running over and the ambulance and you were gone for a real long time at the hospital and I was waiting on your back porch many days later wondering what it felt like to be stitched and how on earth they got your head in an electric sewing machine…when you came home and you weren’t paralyzed as the adults feared you just had a really bad headache and a concussion.  My Gomer Pyle book came in the mail that day and I wrapped it up with my favorite rock with a painted heart on it and gave it to you.  I remember playing darts.  I remember the fat kid up the street and the bully from the other block stealing my homemade easter basket and throwing it in the brook on the way home and pushing me down and you getting it back for me and chasing them away then teaching me how to wrestle.  I weighed about sixty pounds but you taught me to move like a rocket…no one picked on me after that…I remember in the woods that day I was crossing the brook alone to go home and I caught a glimpse of you and the cool guys of the eighth grade and I was not cool and one boy was behind the tree with his “winkie” out and I thought “eww…what a jerk” he was waiting for her the “cool girl” and showing off about it and I looked him right in the eye and wouldn’t look away I froze on that rock and refused to be starred down then the tallest boy, Matt came up to me in the brook on the rocks and I was up to his chest and he said “you saw nothing” and I said “yes I did” and you said, “leave her alone she is cool” and you said “Barb, go home okay” so I did…but I was thinking I wasn’t scared - I was though and you were too I was just to young to realize it.  I remember going to your house in eighth grade and she was their your first girlfriend and you said you’d call me later and you never did and we never played again…and I cried on the way home and cried myself to sleep and wondered why you didn’t want’ to play with me anymore then your second girlfriend came and went and over the years we saw each other and always smiled…after your dad died we emailed for awhile…your mom and I became email buddies I loved her so…she died this week…your sister called me…I brought my mom and met my younger sister and her husband at the wake…I visited her coffin in sadness and prayed and told her in my mind Godspeed Helen…safe travel in God’s arms…I will miss you and I have always loved you…I saw your sister and couldn’t not hug her and then your older brother and hugged him too…the memories of childhood comfort washed over me…our eyes met and yours filled with tears and you thanked me for coming your estranged wife respectfully by your side – she didn’t know who I was at first I guess we all age … lol …then I hugged you as hard as possible and told you I love you dear friend…I am so sorry for your loss…during our visit you looked at me for comfort…I asked for your email address which I had lost over the past year and you asked for mine which was lost when your main drive went down…I am glad I know you in my life…paths go side by side and cross and side by side and cross and over sometimes and sometimes they just go differently…I am so sorry for your pain…you are the best she could have hoped for and your mom knows how you love her…heal yourself dear friend…as for me…I miss you…and I have always wondered what it would have been like if things were different…  Sassy

  

  • 12:40 am
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