Old Friend

Well, I say old friend, but we weren't really friends back then.

Back then was elementary school. She was one of the few students who was as tall as I was (I hit six feet during sixth grade, and she was probably trailing me by two inches, tops).

Anyway, you know how most boys pretend girls are gross in grade school? I wasn't like that. I was all about the girls. Girls are why I sucked at sports: put me at goalie on a soccer field and I'll be daydreaming about some chick when all of a sudden people are shouting because a goal was scored and I did nothing to defend it. Just stood there all slack-jawed.

And I think my thing for tall girls goes back that far, too. Maybe because I was tall myself, but Amazons have lit me up as long as I can remember.



At that age, attraction for girls manifested itself in me in the form of obnoxiousness. Actually, looking at my social calendar these days, I guess it still does. I no longer snap bra straps as a way of introducing myself, though, and that seems like progress.

So anyway, what I remember most vividly was getting kicked in the shins and punched alarmingly hard on the arm by this chick. We actually went to school together all the way through high school, but by the time high school came around I had alienated myself from her (and many, many others) to the point where they might as well not have been in the same building. I only vaguely remember her from those years. We did different extracurricular stuff and had different friends. Her friends, in fact, were probably a few of the other girls I'd managed to frighten completely.

So anyway, she Facebooked me a few weeks back and I've talked to her on the phone some, and it's fun catching up. I stopped off at her work on the way home from mine today and we got to say howdy in person. We get along famously now, as if we really were pals back in the day.

It's funny, too. I remember her being maybe a bit stuck up and stand-offish, but in the brief time I hung out while she closed up shop and took the deposit to the bank, I don't think we passed a stranger. She's one of those people who knows everyone. Maybe she wasn't stuck up and stand-offish at all, maybe it was the bra strap thing...

Em has had an obnoxious classmate or two. She talks about how irritated she is with them, and I tell her it's just because they like her and don't know how to be themselves. She just rolls her eyes and groans. I told her in 25 years or so she'll probably think it's just funny.