Casey

I sometimes tell people I was born in a town called lard. In a way, it's quite true. I was born in Manteca, which means 'lard' in Spanish. The name of the town was actually a spelling mistake; it wasn't supposed to named after pig fat.

The town was growing rapidly, and my parents wanted to move to a less crowded and busy place. So after I finished kindergarten, we moved to a rural town, so small that atlases generally don't mention it. One of the houses next door was home to a family that included Casey, a girl one year younger than me. We soon became friends. It was pretty lucky, if you ask me. I had a friend not long after moving to a new place, and we could literally walk to each other's houses.

The family had a black and tan terrier, probably an Airedale, named Annie. When I first started coming, she would bark at me, since I was a stranger. However, as time passed, she soon grew to like me, so much so that she would jump on me excitedly. There was also a cat, though the gray tabby generally avoided Casey and I. Not all animals enjoy rambunctious children.

Anyway, Casey and I were friends, as were our parents friends with each other. I would often get home, do my homework, and then ask if I could go over to Casey's house. Casey also came over to my house occasionally.

Like a lot of young children, we sometimes got into trouble. Sometimes we would go into the backyard, which wasn't fenced, and there was a whole world out there. We, of course, wanted to explore. Though we were told to stay close to the house, we often tried to wander off into the unknown, trying to go as far as we could without being caught. My friend also had a little playhouse outside, and one day we decided to decorate it with crayons. Casey also taught me the fun of jumping on the bed.

Unfortunately, about a year later, Casey and her family moved away, which was sad for us. We lost contact shortly after. At one point several years later, I regained contact with her through Facebook. We found it difficult to communicate, though, as it had been so long and we didn't know each other anymore. We found ourselves reminiscing more than conversing. Once again, we eventually lost contact.

Sometimes you can't go back to the way things were. When my friend had first moved away, it frustrated me when we lost contact, and I felt angry with the family for it. But sometimes people lose contact, or just drift apart as they change into people who no longer have much in common with each other. But we can still remember the fun times we had together, when we were two little kids, having fun those many years ago.