The Diary of a Friendship

On a warm late August morning in 1979, my dad put me on a Trailways bus in London, Kentucky, headed for my first year of college near Tampa, Florida. In my excitement and apprehension, I forgot to hug him goodbye, then cried for the first 20 minutes of the trip when I realized it. I wouldn't see my family for four months, and I was going to live among strangers - I had no friends, no family where I was going. Daunting for a teenager who hadn't been away from her parents before for more than a week at a stretch. But, Florida! College! By the time we reached the Kentucky - Tennessee line, I was eager to see the palm trees of my new home.

I met Desiree my second day there, when I showed up at her dorm room looking for her roommate Jane. A slender, petite redhead, Desiree was an Air Force brat used to making friends, and soon I became one. We had in common our southern roots, a sharp sense of humor and an intellectual curiosity that led to late night talks over pizza, in t-shirts with our hair piled up any old way. Sometimes I french braided her hair, which reached her waist; when she got it cut in layers, still as long as before, I spent hours with a curling iron, rollers and a brush, helping her fix it in the mornings.

During our first year there people often thought we disliked each other, because of our tart public exchanges, until finally we developed a warning system around the word "pudding" - okay, we were 18. It worked, although then people thought we were fixated on dessert:

Me: "So, anyway, Desiree is a..."

Desiree: "Susanna - pudding!"

Me: "Um, a lovely person, yessir, Desiree is just a jewel, God love 'er."

She left midway through our second year, going back to Arizona where she worked for a law firm. I finished up in Florida, then moved back to Kentucky to get my undergraduate degree. We kept in close touch and, the July after I graduated from college, I went to Arizona for a month long visit.

Have you been to Arizona in July? If you haven't, I have one word for you: Don't.

Temperatures over 75 make me unhappy, and when it crawls into the 90s I do a turtle and refuse to come out. The concept of temperatures over 100 at night was beyond my comprehension. Yet they hauled me out, Desiree and her younger sister Dawn, and made me go to Flagstaff, to the Grand Canyon, to Tucson and Nogales, Mexico, and to the Saguaro National Park, still on my list of beautiful places. But the temperatures were unkind to me, and I developed a nasty heat rash that prevented my wearing a bra for almost a week (crushed by that, I was). In the midst of that uncomfortable week, the three of us decided to make a quick road trip to Las Vegas in Desiree's little tin-bucket car.

Me: "This is a good idea? We don't gamble. And it's hot."

Desiree: "Get in the car."

So there we went, zooming across dry flat desert in a tin bucket with wheels, forked lightning splitting the horizon ahead. A couple of hours into the drive, as time edged toward a sultry, pitch-black midnight, I took over the wheel, driving fast, as usual. The only other traffic was a pokey 18 wheeler ahead, and I whipped out to pass it.

Me: "Oh no!!"

Desiree: "WHAT?!"

Ka thump! Thud! Bounce bounce bounce...

Me: "OHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Me: "I JUST RAN OVER A WOLF!"

Desiree, teeth snapping together: "A WHAT?!"

Dawn, in the backseat pulling her head out of the car roof: "WHAT?!"

Me: "A wolf! It was a wolf in the road!"

Desiree: "Was it dead?"

Me: "It is now."

Silence. A furry lump disappeared in the distance, along with the truck's headlights.

Me: "I think it was dead already."

Silence.

Me: "Do you think I killed your car?"

Desiree: "It's still running."

Me: "Okay."

It was still night when we drove through The Strip on our way to Desiree's friend's house, and it looked amazing. It was less so in the daylight, an aging showgirl with sequins missing. But we went into Circus Circus anyway, where they tried to toss me out for being underage (which at 21 makes you huffy, although within only a few years you're grateful) when I played the slots. Five dollars poorer, we left for home, driving through a rainstorm that ended in a tiny town halfway home, leaving behind a rainbow ribbon of color arching through the sky.

The next years found the two of us moving all around - she to California, me to several places in Kentucky - but we always kept in touch and sometimes she visited. My first year of graduate school, I flew to San Francisco for a conference and squeezed in a weekend visit to LA, where Desiree lived. We drove to Santa Barbara, blocked traffic while I stood in the middle of the street photographing the Hollywood sign, and rediscovered pizza conversations. She was by then engaged to a man who grew up in Louisville, where I lived, and soon after, for the first time, we lived minutes from each other instead of hours. They married the summer I graduated with my master's degree, and I photographed their wedding. We won't discuss that, other than to say the photographs are very nice and we're still friends. It had nothing to do with my moving to New Jersey a few months later. Really.

The next few years were rough. Desiree's sister Dawn became ill with cancer, and Desiree went through some personal tragedies of her own. We talked a lot, me in Yankee New Jersey, her in Kentucky, and it was a comfort to us both. Not long after I bailed from my graduate program and returned to Kentucky, she and her husband moved to Chicago. There, early one July Sunday, she gave birth to her first daughter, Hannah, premature but strong. That afternoon, Dawn, younger than us both, died of breast cancer. The night before, at her parents' home in Alabama, Dawn had stirred briefly from her coma to murmur, "The baby is coming." Desiree and her husband were already at the hospital by then, but neither had called their families. There is an odd, sad comfort in the thought that Dawn may have passed Hannah on their ways to and from heaven.

The years continued, the bonds strengthened, Desiree and family moved to Texas and I returned to New Jersey. Before leaving the cold north, Desiree and David added Natasha, another scrappy preemie, to their family - and Desiree gave her my middle name, Lyn, an honor that brought tears to my eyes then and still does now. James came along soon after, a sturdy boy full-term and full-bore from the start. All show their mother's intelligence, curiosity and independent spirit (traits their father also can claim, but which I staunchly advocate carry their mother's flair). In the past few years, we've met in Texas, New Hampshire and New York City, sharing thoughts, emotions, time with her family. I even pulled their daughter Hannah's first loose tooth while Desiree and David were at a Broadway show.

Hannah, six years old: "My tooth is loose."

Me (wiggling tooth): "Yes. Do you want me to pull it?"

Hannah: "No."

Silence. Natasha and James play in the floor. Hannah wiggles her tooth.

Me: "Do you want me to pull it?"

Hannah: "Yes."

Me: "Are you sure?"

Hannah: "Yes."

Stand Hannah on the toilet. Push on her tooth.

Me: "It's going to hurt. Want me to pull it?"

Hannah, staunch: "Yes."

Me: "Okay."

Push. Pull. Wiggle. Push HARD - root is rotted away but the enamel sticks like a burr to her gum. She starts crying, mouth filling with blood.

Me: "Hannah, I have to finish this now."

Hannah: (sobs)

Finally pull tooth out, wash her mouth out with cold water, give her a wad of tissue to bite on.

Hannah: (crying) "You pulled it!"

Me: "You told me to!"

Hannah: (crying) "Next time don't listen to me!"

Trust me, next time I won't. We sat on the couch, hugging, Hannah calming down only to remember again and start crying. When her parents returned, she tragically showed them the hole and they were swift in their praise of her bravery. Praise goes a long way with kids just like with adults, and soon she was a heroine.

But she still won't let me near her mouth.

Last weekend was Desiree's birthday, two months before mine. We've been friends longer than many marriages last, these days - 23 years in August - through moves, tragedies, funny times and the death of loved ones. It's not been perfect - she has her quirks, and I'm...well...volatile, at times - but she is precious to me, and our friendship has been a strength and stabilizing influence throughout my adult life. She has so much knowledge, so much passion for what interests her, and a drive to do what is right, in every instance, that I can only admire and try to emulate. I'm blessed that on that day in August 1979 a petite Air Force brat with red hair clear down her back took me into her heart. I'm even more blessed that 23 years later, I'm still there.

I love you, Desiree. Happy birthday.


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