All day I have been thinking about my childhood friends. I have been wondering what has become of them. I had several good friends when I was a young girl.  All of this reflecting  started with a conversation I had with D. this morning about Billy a boy who I used to hang around with when I was six years old. I would see him just about every Sunday when I would go visit my aunt.  His grandfather was a veteran.  He was a WWI vet.  Around this time, I used to worry about the Russians bombing the hell out of us.  John F. Kennedy was president.  When I was supposed to beore preoccupied or occupied things that pertained to six year old girls, I was more worried about when my father was going to start building a bomb shelter.  I wanted a bomb shelter for my birthday or Christmas; it didn’t matter as long as my father would build one that would house my parents, my brother and my aunt and her drunk woman-chasing husband.  Billy’s grandfather would confirm my fears because he had a pantry full of cans of food, water, and other stuff you would need in case our town got bombed.  He told me that those supplies were for emergencies and a direct hit on our town was one of them. I went home and told my dad this and he just kept reading the newspaper.  After awhile, he looked over the newspaper at me and said, “We are not going to get bombed and I am not building a bomb shelter. If I find out that we are getting bombed, I will go to your school and bring you home. We will all go to Mexico.” I was so relieved to hear that my father had a plan.  Mexico was twenty-four miles away.  That was far enough for me to feel safe. My family’s first language is Spanish, so we would be fine living in Mexico.  The Russians were not going to bomb Mexico.  Then I started worrying about whether or not I could make friends, would I have problems in school, where would we live and other things related to moving to a new place.

I was amazed by my friend because he knew so much about football, baseball, and all sorts of stuff my father never talked about.  It was obvious that Billy spent a lot of time with his father; this was something I never did at the time because my father worked twelve hours a day, six days a week.  He, his grandmother, my aunt, and I would sit under this huge tree and talk about all sorts of things.  I remember the two women treating us as if we were adults.  I never had anyone pay that much attention to what I had to say.  I remember those Sundays fondly.  Later I would find out that these afternoons kept my aunt sane because her husband would be gone for a few days drinking his paycheck away.  I just thought my aunt was very tough and I admired her very much.

Billy and I never had a fight.  I remember being a little jealous because he had met a little girl named Linda on the first day of school. We would talk about toys, horses, and cats.  He would describe his house out in the country and how some day soon he would get a pony.  Back then, I wanted a pony so bad but my chances of getting one were as good as having a bomb shelter built. Billy would tell me that when he got a pony, I could go over to his house and ride it. He would talk about all of the places we could go exploring and how we could take a lunch and water so we could stop somewhere to eat.

The last weekend that I saw him, I remember telling him about my birthday party that I was going to have.  I was just going crazy with excitement because my mom had actually bought invitations, filled them out and delivered them to our neighbors.  I wanted to invite Billy but my mom said that he lived too far away. I had saved an invitation so that he could see it. He liked it very much and said that when he turned seven, he would get some invitations like the one I showed him.

I had a fabulous time on my 7th birthday.  It was on a Wednesday, after school, that I had several of my friends from the neighborhood come over.  My mom bought a  chocolate birthday cake at the supermarket, some paper plates with Barbi on them, sugary concentrate for punch, icing-covered animal cookies, and two half gallons of ice cream.  My aunt had come over to help my mom with the party.  After my party, I went with my father to take my aunt home.  When we arrived to her house, my uncle was standing at the gate in front of their house. I could tell there was something wrong because he never greeted my aunt when she got home from being at our house because either he was too busy reading the newspaper or watching television.  He came up to my dad’s truck and he told us that Billy’s father had been in an accident.  He was a gunner at the army proving ground.  They had been testing some kind of new artillery and it backfired.  In the explosion, Billy’s father along with three other men died.  My uncle had to help my aunt out of the truck because she looked like she was about to faint.  I remember that we left as soon as my aunt made it into her house.  She had left the two pieces of cake she had brought home for my uncle and Billy’s grandparents. I thought maybe I could take their piece of birthday cake to them but I looked over at his grandparents house and I saw that the lights in the house were off and their car was gone. On the way home, I had a bunch of questions about people dying and Billy’s dad for my father, but he just kept looking straight ahead  hardly answering me.  I had never seen him appear so serious.

The Sunday following Billy’s father’s accident, I didn’t go to my aunt’s house. In fact, it was over a month before I went back to visit her.  My father had been spending more time with us on Sundays.  Billy never went back to his grandmother’s house after his father died and my aunt gave me strict instructions not to ask Billy’s grandparents about him or his father. Later, I would learn that his mom didn’t get along with his grandparents and she would not allow Billy or his sisters to go visit them.

I didn’t see Billy until several years later when we were teenagers.  He went to the same school as I did, but we didn’t hang out.  He was in a gang and I was a total nerd. Billy and I would sneak glances at each other and kind of signal a “Hi” to each other.  Several years later, I found out that he was in the sheriff’s department.  I wish the best for him.