Growing up, I attended many schools before entering 9th grade. Nine, to be exact. There was Cash Elementary in Arkansas, Western Hills Elementary in Omaha, Minne Lusa Elementary in Omaha, Fort Calhoun Elementary in rural Nebraska, Saratoga Elementary in Omaha, and shoot I can't remember the one I went to in the 3rd grade. Once again, our family was moving as I was getting ready for 7th grade. We were leaving from a beautiful spacious house in northeastern Nebraska and a school that I'd grown quite attached to. The landlord had died and his son wanted the house we were in. It was such a neat place. It sat on many acres, had pine trees, bike paths, the house itself had four fireplaces and a wrought iron spiral staircase up thru the house's center, and there were even a gaggle of dogs that were left there by the previous occupants. The elementary school had precious teachers who cared about their students, a good natured principal who was always hanging out with us on the playground, and an overall feeling of a pretty little community.
When we had to move we didn't have many choices; back then the rental market in that area was very tight and our parents settled on a piece of shit house in a very dirty isolated housing development called "Goose Haven," in Iowa. Most of the residents lived in shoddy trailers while we were considered the "elite" because we were in one of the few stick-built houses. However, our shangri-la had no siding. Just tar paper. The garage was a very tall shack, with no front door. The interior of the house smelled and looked as though homeless people had been crashing there.
Every time I smell Windex mixed with dirt I think of that place.
We learned very quickly that the neighborhood kids were like a bunch of "Lord of the Flies" psychos, who probably hadn't had parenting in several years.
I recall sitting in the bed of my dad's pick up truck staring at this new address of ours, trying not to cry.
Of course we cleaned up the place. I remember the flooring in the kitchen was plywood. The flooring in the living room was patches of very old linoleum and an old rug. Many spots of the house had nothing on the walls, just bare two by fours.
Aaaaah, Iowa.
We immediately began riding our bikes out in the neighborhood, exploring. The kids we encountered were vulgar, filthy, and wild. The Missouri River was walking distance, but the water was so muddy and nasty that if you put your foot in it you had to find something to wipe the mud away.
One particular family, the Camdens, were tall and mean. April and her brother (can't recall his name) were like the most awful thing. They would say nasty things to us in an attempt to start a fight. Every day. EVERY DAY. Didn't matter what we were doing, they were always there trying to pick a fight. Screaming, cussing, intimidating, and just plain mean.
So then school started. We had a 17 mile bus ride to Missouri Valley, and unfortunately the whole way there was torture with all the vulgar, wild neighborhood kids. I have no idea how Mr. Hileman the bus driver ever put up with it.
There I was, once again the new kid in the school. I was the new kid nearly every year so I'd gotten kind of used to it. I found ways to suppress the anxiety, I suppose.
My homeroom teacher, Mr. Hornbeck, was okay. He was just another teacher. The students stared at me of course because I was the new kid. My locker partner was this 6 foot tall enormous girl who wasn't very bright and she would steal my text books when she lost hers.
Another new school. No friends. And I had to search desperately for text books.
But then this girl named Brandy Sherman started talking to me. She sat to my right in Mr. Hornbeck's classroom. I remember she had all this curly light brown hair, and she wore makeup. MAKEUP!! Eye shadow and everything. I'd never seen that before. But she was so friendly. Nobody had been friendly to me in so long. She introduced me to all kinds of kids, and soon I was feeling more comfortable.
Seventh grade was starting to look okay.
Brandy and I were buds for quite a while. By a while I mean that whole year.
She lived with her mom and stepdad in a farm house outside of Missouri Valley, so it wasn't actually possible for me to just hop on my bicycle to go see her, it would've been a 16 mile ride. And I couldn't call her because it was long distance from our house.
But at school we were inseperable.
We were busted in class all the time for passing notes. And they weren't ordinary notes. They were pages and pages of writing, drawings, jokes, you name it.
We stood up for each other whenever there was trouble. We spent our lunches and recesses together. We were really great friends.
Through a series of awful circumstances, Brandy had to move in with her sister in Iowa City. To a 13 year old, that may as well have been Japan. I'd lost my bud. Before she moved she gave me a gold band and said, "This will be our friendship ring." I put it on my finger and never took it off.
We wrote letters, but then after a year or two we lost contact when I moved yet again and she moved to Colorado Springs.
I hate to say that Classmates.com is so effective, but it would be silly to deny it. I had registered my name under several different schools, since I went to more than a few, in case any of my old classmates were interested in looking for me. I had no way to find Brandy because I didn't know what high school she went to in Colorado. I had tried for a year or two with no luck.
Then one day I got an email thru Classmates.com from "Hey It's Me Brandy." I cried that whole day. Everyone thought I'd lost my mind. When I told her I was still wearing the friendship ring she had no idea what I was talking about. To her defense, she'd given it to me in a very troubled time and it had been over 13 years. We spent hours on the phone and exchanged emails quite regularly, getting caught up on every little event in each other's lives for the past 13 years.
But now we're so sophisticated, with our blogs and facebook pages. We can see each other with just a click even though we're 2,000 miles apart.
After getting seperated from Brandy I never had a friend like that. To this day, I still have never had someone as close to me as Brandy was in seventh grade.
Stephen King wrote at the end of "Stand By Me" (originally titled "The Body") that you "never have friends in your life as good as the ones you had when you were twelve."
