I haven't been able to quit thinking about my childhood friend who passed away this past summer in July. All these years and we were not close. We didn't speak ever again after I stayed a night at University of Texas with her. I have no idea why I was at UT nor how I got there because I didn't have a car. I was just down the freeway in San Marcos at Southwest Texas State but now called Texas State. It is just one of those blip memories and I guess I remembered the most important part, Leah. Our paths had gone separate ways. I became a Christian my junior year in high school but we did have a drama class together our senior years. She was meant for the stage and got parts in the musicals and such. My comedic side didn't really come about until long after high school being too afraid to be different than everybody else. For our senior drama exam we had to participate in a one act play. Leah got a dramatic role and I played the lion from the Wizard of Oz. Not the same play. Hmmm....I think maybe I did get the better end of the deal. Back in the day schools had drum and bugle corps not dancing corps but there still was a marching band. Leah made it into the Rebelettes, maybe playing fife or drum...I interviewed with the committee when they came to the junior high school and the first question I was asked, if I didn't make it into Rebelettes would I play volleyball. Being 6' in the 9th grade and athletic of course that is where they steered me. Leah came into her own and she took the path of the day, being a hippie. My path was determined for me, a dork. By our senior year we were nostalgic friends. Maybe we rode together to school sometimes but most probably my senior year cause I had use of a car.
During the summers of 8th-10th grade we hung out in the evenings at her house. Cute boys lived next door to her and we never knew when one might just speak to us. We spent a lot of time walking around the neighborhood. It was in 1969 and 1970 cause we talked a lot about UT winning national championships. Leah knew she was going to the University of Texas. She had her life planned out. She was going to go to law school and become a lawyer just like her dad. In 1969 and 1970 on those walks my plans were how I was going to, now as the young people say...unalive myself, once I got a drivers license. I was miserable without hope and saw no other way out...but then God. I became a Christian in January 1971 and got my license a year or so after that. So, yep God's timing. And I think that is what has me so pensive about Leah and her life. Somewhere in those years between she, graduated from UT but she didn't go to law school there. I think she went in Houston. She got married and I think she had a daughter. She practiced law as a defense attorney with a couple of other specialties thrown in. But I don't think her career is the career she had planned upon. Doing some Google research tells me some of that info. She passed away in July, buried near her father and now also her mom who passed away in December. No obituary for Leah, at least none I can find. Surely her life meant something. I did reach out to someone who I thought might have known her and I did get some limited knowledge about her and that helped me with looking into other avenues. I found a picture, two pictures really of her in 2024. She did not look like the same Leah, in fact I would have never recognized her. Interestingly, we lived in the same area or at least her office was nearby. Of course I know I don't look the same as I did back in the day either, but people like her usually hold onto their physical appearance. I think what haunts me are those walks with everything she planned in such detail and direction. She was meticulous about her appearance. Me not so much cause there wasn't a direction I could go on without some money. I did the best I could with what I had and it was a battle to have that.
Last night I saw something that got my attention as I searched for anything else to know about my childhood friend. Surprisingly, I found something and then I knew exactly why there wasn't more information out there. A post from her daughter on FB,
For me, silence is abandonment.
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