A Lifetime of Friendships: Part 1

One of my former high school classmates that I became acquainted with again on Facebook often makes me think about how Facebook brought many of us back in touch. It made me also think of the friendships throughout my life, especially since I moved quite a bit when I was younger, and so there were many lives touched and then separated along the way. I started a mental run down of my first friendships, and got lost on tangents in my mind along the way. Although I might end up with a stream of consciousness set of articles, I thought I'd start to write them down any way. Here is Part 1.

The first friends I remember were those I made after age 3, which was when my family first moved to Oak Park, Michigan. We lived in a modest three bedroom house on Church Street, about a half mile south of 9 Mile Road. There was, of course, my usual playmate: my brother Ricardo, and I remember him from disjointed, fuzzy, half-moment memories from before this time, like when we lived in Yonkers, New York, and the two of us road our tricycles around the living room, much to the consternation of our downstairs neighbor. I remember being scared when she came to the door to complain, and then later not being scared, because she became a good friend to my mother, and adored us. I was probably somewhere between 2 and 3 at the time, which means Ricardo was between 3 1/2 and 4 1/2 years old.

In Oak Park, there were many kids on our street. The one I remember best was my "best friend", Lori Mayer. She lived across the street and was an only child. I wasn't allowed to cross the street alone, and neither was she, but sometimes we did and then got into trouble. I remember us playing Barbie from each side of the road and her being delighted when I ran across with my Barbie in hand, and then ran backwards across again, before we could be caught. She kept wanting me to do it again, and I think I complied a few times. We were 4 then. I remember us saying the same thing in unison and her telling me that was a co-in-ci-dence. Her father had just explained the word to her, and she taught it to me.

We were both friends with Denise, also our age, who lived about 4 houses down from me, on my side of the street. Denise had an older sister, and I think an older brother too. The sister pushed me and Denise too high on the teeter-totter on the swing set in their back yard. Denise got scared, but her sister laughed and wouldn't slow us down. I dragged my foot on the ground to stop us - de rigeur practice for speed control. My foot went under the foot rest and ended up between the ground and it. I screamed in pain and cried, real tears and real screams, not the crocodile tears I used as a young drama queen when I didn't get my way.

I have a picture in my mind of my mother, wearing navy shorts and a navy and white striped, sleeveless top, hearing me and running through the unfenced back yards, over the flower beds that divided the space, to Denise's yard. She carried me home, and later, at the emergency room, we discovered I'd broken my leg. I had the cast on for the rest of the summer, or so it seemed. The cast on my small leg went all of the way up my right thigh, even though the break was close to the ankle. I remember going to Howard Johnson's for all-you-can-eat fish fry night and a "little girl" asking her mother why I was wearing such a big sock. She must have been 2 to be little to a 4 year old.

I had a walking cast and was really bad about using the crutches - they were a bother. The neighbors were really nice to me. I got so many gifts! My babysitter drew flowers and other pictures on my cast, so I was sorry to say goodbye to it and leave it at the doctor's office when they cut the plaster off me, and placed it in a bin of other removed casts, all of which dwarfed mine, less than half their size. I was also saddened to see the teeter-totter on the curb awaiting the trash pick-up. It was my fault for not waiting a little longer to begin slowing down.

Nothing related to the swing set incident, but Denise was not a great friend. She was my first acquaintance "friend" and not a true one. She played with me as a second choice. Either we played with Lori, or if Lori wasn't available, then she'd play with me. I had the feeling that she and Lori talked about me, and that the talk came from Denise, not Lori.

I had other playmates on the street, but proximity, age or something else, made Lori and Denise the ones I remember best. There were Janice and Richard next door, but they were much older, though not old enough to babysit for us. I loved that their names were almost like Ricardo and Janet -- our names. There was a girl a year younger named Jodie, with whom I also played Barbies.

I remember another girl, although her name is lost to me. She lived half a block away - a big distance, but only a few houses farther than Jodie. She was likely the first African-American friend I had. I liked her a lot, but within a short time, suddenly all of my other playmates were not allowed to play with her because she was "colored". I was mystified by the word, and completely did not understand. I heard that their family was "block busting". Again, I did not understand. Fortunately, my parents were not like the others, and I was NOT forbidden to play with her. She lived sort of far from me, given our ages, so I am fuzzy about our friendship. I think either we moved or they did, but until then, we were friends, just like any of the other kids.

I remember a girl I knew from school, and I think it was when we still "lived on Church". She was from a Dutch family, although I don't recall her having an accent herself. She was pretty, with long, straight, dark hair and bangs across her forehead. She was sweet and gentle, but one of the few friends I knew who "was not Jewish". I asked to have her at my birthday party one year and I was very happy, letting out a sigh, when my mother said "that's ok", when I told her the friend wasn't Jewish. I remember when we invited her she said she didn't have money for a gift, and of course, we said we wanted her to come any way. She brought dutch chocolates. I felt privileged to have her come to my party.

My mother had a good friend, Mrs. Sandles, and she had a down's syndrome son named Lee, who was my age. Lee was main streamed in school, and always struggled. As usual, I was blind to differences and played with him as if he was any one else. I didn't understand why other kids did not treat him well or want to play with him. I remember going to a birthday party of his where we played all kinds of games, including some where you needed a partner, and someone saying "let's have his girlfriend be his partner". It surprised me to be called his girlfriend...

When I was 7, we moved to another house in Oak Park, a nicer one, where Ricardo and I each had our own bedroom. I lost touch with Lori in moving, and although I met her again in High School much later, we were never in the same circles. She is a Facebook friend to me today.

I ran into Lee Sandles again in High School and found him withdrawn, very sad, and teased by the other kids. I don't think he remembered me, and there was something about him that made me afraid to approach him. I wish I had. I've heard that he passed away within the years after graduation, but did not know what happened. My mother had lost touch with his even before we moved back to Michigan.

On the house on Dartmouth in Oak Park, we went to a different school, Roosevelt Elementary, which much later became a school for special needs children. I remember being shocked by a girl named Julie, in second grade, who did not care if her underwear showed as her skirt flew in the breeze when we were spinning on the merry-go-round as the boys were pushing it for a bunch of the girls. She thought me a priss, and I was most shocked that she didn't care when you were supposed to. It was an era where girls wore dresses and that made some playground stuff hard for a tom-boy like me that would prefer to be upside down on the monkey bars, and was just getting indoctrinated that my panties should not show... I don't remember the context, but I remember her talking about being in "Hurricane Hilda", and that proving that she was something (tough, smart, reckless, better than me?) that I can't recall.

Julie was not a friend either, but Diane Merrich was my best friend. She had short, dark, curly hair and an unusual contagious laugh. The other kids always wanted her to laugh on demand to hear it. She lived two or three doors down and we played together all of the time, sometimes with her younger sister, Lisa. Her older sister, Karen (?), was a little too grown up for us, being about 2 years older. After I moved we wrote to each other for several years, and then lost touch.

During our time apart, she also moved. My move was to Gainesville, Florida and hers to Farmington Hills, Michigan. When I moved back to Michigan, I wrote her, but I don't think we ever got in touch again. I ran into Lisa at a gym in Ann Arbor, Michigan when I was in my mid to late twenties. She was the one giving me the obligatory tour the first day. She told me that Diane was married or about to get married and still lived in the Detroit area. I think Lisa was attending University of Michigan or maybe Eastern Michigan University, both very close to the gym.

In second grade I had another friend from school named Harold who I used to play with on weekends some times. We had to go to each other's house by car, so we did not play that often. He was the first boy that was a real friend of mine. Again, in High School, we saw each other again. He was also one of the underdogs who always was teased. I don't know why though. Even in 9th grade he seemed to have the weight of his oppression pressing down on him, making his shoulders stoop, and barely saying hello to me or to anyone. I think we might have had an odd class or so together, but I did not reconnect at that time.

Another friend I enjoyed a lot, but did not get to see much was a girl named Rochelle. I could swear she lived around the block from me, but maybe it was another block or so away, and I would have needed to cross the street to see her. I liked to play with her, and was always very happy when my mother arranged for us to play. I think I knew her because of our mothers. I don't know if I knew her last name and sometimes I wonder if a girl from my High School graduating class named Rochelle is her or not.

When I was 8 we moved to Gainesville, Florida, where my father earned his PhD in Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering at the University of Florida, and I, at first, thought that Gatorade was derived from actual alligators. I spent a lonely third grade year at school, teased mercilessly by the other kids, playing kick ball with the boys at recess because the girls didn't like me. There was a nice, but unattractive, girl who was asked to show me around the first few days, and I liked her, but never got close. There was one of the first of the "beautiful but mean" girls I've known in my life, named Jill, who always asked me why my hair was not brushed and why my skirts were so short. (I was growing, but my mother didn't notice). I remember taking the stitches out of the hem of a skirt while wearing it at school, trying to make it longer. Even in the days of mini-skirts, the skirt was a bit short.

At home, across the street, lived a girl named Martha Williams who became my best friend. She was cool and everyone liked her a lot. Our street - NW 40th Drive -- was the dividing line between school districts. She went to the other school. In the neighborhood, we were fast friends, and she made me cool enough for the other kids. Ricardo and I used to play dodge frisbee and softball with Bobby, Jimmy and Michael Lamb, a large kid named Jesse. Lauren, Lindsay, and Lucy Layton lived next door to the Lamb's and we climbed the huge tree in between their homes. Lauren was my age, and much too prissy for me. Lindsay and Lucy were a bit younger, but much nicer. I remember asking their mother, after she had gotten her hair "frosted" why she would want to make it grey. Across the street from the Layton's was Julie (?), and her german shepard, King. She was beautiful, and Bobby Lamb had a crush on her. I had a crush on Bobby. They were both the same age as my brother. Ricardo called Julie's hair "egg shell hair" because it was long and straight and very shiny. I did not understand why he didn't like it, when I thought it was the ideal hair.

The Layton's had a mean chihuahua named Chi-chi, but we ended up with one of her pups, Sandy, shortly after my 9th birthday. I used to go over to see the puppies everyday after they were born, and it was only natural to have one offered to us. My mother, terrified of dogs her entire life, said yes to that chihuahua puppy, and we had her for 18 years. Except for feeding, which bonded Sandy to my Mom, Sandy was "my dog", and I loved to spend time with her. I read dog books and provided what little training she had, when I was nine.

In fourth grade, the school district line changed and Martha was in my class. Things changed and I was accepted because I came along with Martha as part of the package. Martha's mom was divorced, and so they lived as just the two of them, along with their dog, Cucha. Her mom was very young looking and I called her Martha's sister by mistake many times before I really got to know Martha. Her mother's name was Mary, probably one of the few times I knew a first name for a friend's mother or father. Martha taught me to dance to rock and roll to a Monkees record and I remember hearing the Nancy Sinatra song "These Boots are Made for Walking" at Martha's house. We used to climb on her flat pitch roof, shimmying up a support post on her porch, and playing up there. My Dad yelled at me when he caught me up there once and made me come down. She had some gerbils, and they quickly became lots and lots of gerbils. She used to sell the babies back to the pet store.

After I moved to Alabama, when I was 10, we began to write to each other, and probably continued that through some time in junior high. I saw her once when I went to Florida for Spring Break in college with a car full of friends. She was working at a Burger King, and we stopped to eat there and I got to talk with her when she was on her break. She had stayed in Gainesville and went to a local Community College. I don't know if she went on to a 4-year college after that or not. When we were moving, she was starting to attend a private school beginning in 5th grade. She was smart and her mother wanted her to have a better education than Gainesville schools provided.

In 5th and 6th grade in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, I had a rough time with friends. We lived on a cul-de-sac (then called a dead end street) with only five homes and there was one other kid, Michael Elder, but he went to private school. He was a year in-between me and Ricardo in age, and we played with him a lot. We met their family and found our house because his family belonged to the one Jewish Temple in Tuscaloosa. His father was a holocaust survivor, much older than my parents, and had the concentration camp tattoo on his arm. He was quite eccentric, but it is now more understandable to me than at the time. Mike's mom was not Jewish, but I'm not sure that was clear to me back then. I remember picking pecans from her Aunt's tree somewhere else in Tuscaloosa and my Mom learning how to make real southern pecan pie. She had an apple head chihuahua and that was when I first learned that there were pear heads (like Sandy) and apples, like hers.

At school, the kids didn't like me. Being Jewish, having foreign parents, and being a yankee, were bad starts, and dressing in the home made clothes my mother made me and being out of style did not help either. I never had a real friend in Tuscaloosa, and it made me very very sad. I used to cry on my way home when I was teased and called names in school. My mother picked me up in a shopping center across the street from the school. I remember one day bursting into tears as I stepped in the car (since I was trying to hold it back so the kids did not see me). It was not long after we moved, so when my mother asked me what was wrong, all I could say was "I miss Martha". It was only a part of the answer, but I did not have a chance to give more, and my mother's aping of me later that day when she told my Dad about it made me, perhaps wrongly, never trust her with a confidence again. I was 10.

There was a girl who was a "frenemy" named Brenda Pennigton. Sometimes I thought she was my friend, but she was trying to keep her distance. There was another girl who hated me beyond any reason. Her name was Vicky Raymond, and she would go out of her way to push me into walls, and certainly to call me names. Tuscaloosa was another place where I rarely played with the girls at recess, because they wouldn't let me. Every once in a while I got to jump rope with the class, but usually I either played alone or the boys would let me play kickball with them, since I was good enough.

For a brief time we had other neighbors with kids on our street. Maria moved next door with her family, into a house owned by the Edges. The Edges had owned the entire street at one time, and now owned a vacant lot at the entrance, and two houses, one of which they lived in, and one they rented. They were down on their luck, and he drank. He stopped when they became "saved". I remember going to a true Southern Baptist Revival on a Wednesday night, with the Edges and my Mother. I still remember the analogy from the minister of how "we are the glove and god is the hand in the glove". It was an experience.

Maria spent time with me mostly because there was not much else to do in the neighborhood, but I thought she was cool, and I wanted to be like her. She was a few years older than me and I'm not sure where she went to school, or if I knew her only in the summer. I know they moved because the Edges wanted to move back into that house, and they did not want to move the other, smaller house across the street where the Edges lived. I also remember she had a brother, much older, who had been in a rehab program of sorts and had hepatitis from his drug use. It was about 1971, and I was 11.

After Maria moved, the Edges rented the smaller house to a family with about 6 children and I don't remember the number of adults. They were poor, and the kids were kind of left on their own a lot. The oldest girl was my age, but did not go to school with me. I remember my parents took over some old clothes of mine, including a maxi dress that the kids in school said was too short on me. The taller-than-me older girl wore it happily, and my Dad commented that it was not too short for her to wear. (Ah, perspective). I used to play with those kids, but my mother was not happy about it. Some of the other neighbors complained to the city about the number of people living in the house and they were forced to move.

When we lived in Alabama, my Dad taught at the University of Alabama during Fall through Spring, and he worked at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama in the summers. He helped design the lunar rover. We lived in an apartment complex with a pool and lots of kids, and there I was accepted and well liked. If only I could have lived there year round! After the second summer, and the end of the two-year summer program for professors, we ended up moving back to Michigan, where Dad went back to his Mechanical Engineering job at Ford Motor Company. We moved back to Oak Park, and I began Junior High, a particularly difficult age for moving and making friends. -- More on that in the next installment.