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"Fragments and crumbs of life, all the little pieces" John Ruskin, 1853 I think of youth’s sweet friendships when I was learning how to form bonds with people outside my own family. They were the building blocks for the many friendships that have come and gone since I left my home to start my adult life. In fragments they come to me now. I recall only pieces and sometimes not even faces appear with the memories! So long ago, but how sweet the memories. I recall them one by one: PAM: Not from my school. I recall her from church. Of this first friendship I recall great excitement running to the wall where we left little notes for each other in the crannies between the bricks and my joy in opening the notes she had left me! LUANNE: From elementary school I remember her as living across from a park and nearby a penny candy store. Of plain timid Luanne, I recall her being a part of the lively slumber parties I was invited to. We drifed apart. I recall she blossomed into a beautiful young woman in high school. ROSEMARY: Her face I cannot clearly recall, but vivid is my memory of where she lived, on the street behind my street, and how we played games with her siblings. With her was my first Ouija board experience. So surprised were we to see it move beneath our fingers, spelling out strange answers to our questions! SHEILA POOLE: my best friend in my junior high days, who moved in right down the street from where I lived. I recall fragments of dancing to records like “Sugar, Sugar,” gossiping for hours over the phone, crushing on her older brother Danny, and the time I traveled with her family to Alabama,where she originally had lived. One of my best memories was visiting her “sweet home Alabama” as her father drove 90 miles per hour all the way there. And then meeting her handsome older cousin Glen, the proverbial “son of a preacher man” and going on a double date. Oh, his long delicious kisses in the back of the car where Sheila sat in the front kissing her boyfriend Jack. MARGO: a “bad” girl with an alcoholic mother, Margo explained to me all about the birds and the bees. I enjoyed walking to elementary school with her. Later when Sheila Poole came along, Margo cozied up to Sheila’s brother Danny and I would see them steaming up Danny’s car windows as they made out in Danny’s car outside the school. They got married while Margo was in Junior High! THE OTHER SHEILA: Her last name I cannot recall. But I CAN remember her sweet little face and her long black hair. From India, she was my only friend who lived out in the rural area. I remember her mother’s strange delicous foods, making prank calls during a slumber party there, and the time her father scolded me fiercely for stepping on ants in front of their house! CHRISTINE: I remember disliking her when a boy I was interested in asked her to dance at a junior high dance. Somehow we ended up talking to each other after the dance and forming an instant connection. I realized she was much more interesting than the silly guy I’d been interested in. I recall her moving away soon thereafter and missing her so much! NANCY HOLTORF: I remember her name and the fact that she was skinny. I know we were good friends, but my only memory is being with her the last night of my life for trick or treating. Feeling too old for it, we walked on our knees to the doors of the houses where we knocked , believing our costumes could disguise our true size! Whatever happened to our friendship? Perhaps she moved away. DEBRA (Debbie) Kershinske: Her face, anorexic looking body (she rarely ate) and the short hair style she always wore is imprinted in my mind forever. We were best friends in high school. Though very different from me in personality, Debbie was always with me. I recall the time she drove the wrong way on the freeway late at night! A huge worrier, she panicked , but I instructed her to simply go across the middle of the freeway and return home the “right” way! Debbie broke my heart when she left for school, married a doctor and never returned any more of my letters that I wrote her. SHELLIE MILLER: I finish with Shellie, the girl most like me, with a sturdy body and same last maiden name as mine. Also, like me, she came from a very large family. The fragments of memories that stand out for me with Shellie are the fun we had at her slumber parties listening to Moody Blues, hanging out with other lovely girls, and the time we all pretended to be drunk (none of us never having drunk alcohol in our lives) and the way we paraded down one of our small city’s streets late at night, hooting and singing, being outrageously silly! Even on my FB today, Shellie remains a friend I can reach out to if I want to, but we rarely do . . . Lives change. People go their own ways. Ten is the number of strong bonds I can now recall with ten very different girls, and I know there were even more than just those ten! What we all shared was that desire to just connect and enjoy our girlhood together. These girls were the foundation for me of how friendships form. Other beautiful friends have come and gone as I transitioned throughout my life from school to new states, and through different phases of my life. The names of my sweet childhood friends and the pieces of memories I shared with them are forever engraved on my mind. Aug. 29, 2020 for All The Little Pieces Poetry Contest Sponsor: Constance La France

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