We met when we were 8 and 9

I promise myself I’ll get to balance the check book, eat a spoonful of chocolate frosting and stretch out my crossed legs once I write something.
Allison and I used to walk through clothing aisles for fun. We’d search for the ugliest article, hold it up for the other to see across the way, make a sound like only a 13 year old can and laugh like crazy. Really it was a sport for us, at least once a week for many months. I thought not once about who we might be annoying or not impressing. We weren’t impressed and everybody should know right? Gblaahch!
We also rode our bikes between our homes, through the middle of Evanston, mostly down Wesley. Lots of yellow houses on that route. We cleaned her house once a week too because she had chores to do but we wanted to be together. I avoided her cat. Beautiful but unfriendly. We sometimes spent an afternoon in her parent’s bedroom den where the typewriter sat and wrote stories and poems. We danced all over the living room, we cried (a lot) at all the trouble life was becoming as we got older, we sang real loud to Duran Duran and Simon and Garfunkel as it played on the turntable that sat in the corner of the dining room I don’t remember ever seeing anyone eat in since there was a more convenient dining table in the kitchen. We watched Alex, The Life of a Child more than once and cried every time. I can’t even write that with out starting to cry. We played badminton in her yard most warm afternoons, our only objective to see how long we could keep the birdie in the air. When I looked toward the house from my side of the net I always saw a gallon of tea basking in the sun on a yard table. We walked to the beach, walked aimlessly around downtown Evanston. One summer she helped me watch a couple brothers who were 10 and 12. By then we were 14 and 15.
Time went by.
I went to college for a semester and discovered Natalie Goldberg’s book Writing Down the Bones. I was 21. Most of what I can remember from then on is sitting across from each other at a small cafe table, cigarettes burning in the ashtray, 2 cups of coffee in white ceramic mugs, our heads bowed over our spirals, each writing rapidly, aiming for our first thoughts for a full 10 minutes. When time was up we’d raise our heads and look at each other, eyes dazed, bodies resettling into the moment, breathe deep and smile. Then we’d each read aloud what we’d just written. Her pieces were these intense journeys into the heart. Her imagery was rich. I don’t know what I wrote. I have all or most of it in a box in my bedroom. We’d immediately choose another first line or topic then bow again to the rush of creativity.
I wrote with many friends over the years in just this way. I’ve been there when people who never thought they could write looked up after reading what they’d written (or listened as I read aloud with their permission since they felt embarrassed) either with a full smile or holding in a smile of pride, delighted at their work. But it was the hours with Allison that are the foundation. At one point we lived in the same building, sharing morning coffee with our legs stretched out before us, a crate for an end table, keeping a close on eye on her most recent cat Cassidy who was aggressively playful and more than a little scary. We’d talk shop in the evening after our shifts of waiting on the public, helping them eat. Eventually I moved away into the cornfields and she moved away to another state.
Time keeps us aware through the harder tests of becoming an adult as well as the inevitable challenges of an expectation of maturity.
A few months back I saw a friends daughter with her friend at Target. They didn’t see me. One of them held out a fascinating shirt from the round rack for the other to appreciate, crinkled her nose, made a unique noise and they burst out laughing.
At first I thought about immaturity. Then I thought about friendship.