The very first friend I remember calling my best friend was while we were staying at my grandma and grandpa's house up-north. There was another friend that informed me that Santa Claus came on Christmas eve. This was because the year we lost our house, Santa did not come. I told myself on Christmas Eve that year it must be Christmas Day night; I had not been that bad. The little friend informed me Santa had came to her house. I don't remember her name or even what she looked like. I just know she lived next door to us on Morley. Not long after Christmas we went to Grandma and Grandpa Carte's house. We stayed there for four months, in the house with them, before my daddy came and brought us to Alabama. Christine was her name. Her last name was, I think Ossimocker. That is the name I have in my mind. I was only five or six so I may have just made that up in my little mind. She was as much about adventure as I was. We found a baby duck that had died and made a huge production of a funeral for the duck. She was Catholic, so I let her take charge of the service. I knew nothing about funerals since I had never been to one in my life. I was only five, that was not unusual. The duck funeral took place on the service road that ran at the back of Christine Ossi-what-ever's house. We had flowers picked from my grandfathers great peonies that grew beside the driveway. The duck was in a shoe box. This was a good funeral for a duck, anyone would have to agree. She was so important to me since at my other school I was more than an outcast. I was terribly poor and really looked it when I went to school each day. Mama had really tried to show Grandma and Grandpa that she took good care of us. She baby sat after we were evicted from the previous house and bought us new clothes, so I looked better. She had to buy us new clothes, because everything that we had in the house on Morley was put on the street and she never went back to get it. It had been taken to Mr. Grass's garage and left. I looked now as if I could have a friend instead of no one wanting to be my friend. So the beginning of lots of best friends started while I was at school close to my mama's mom and dad's. Christine was a friend that I really wanted to do good things for, even at five years old. On her birthday this got me in a heap of trouble. I may have never been the best kid in the world, anyway. This time it really showed how sneeky I could be. Mama had saved all the money she could for the move to Alabama. Daddy called often telling her he was going to take our family there. The money she saved was in the dresser drawer in the room she stayed in at Grandma and Grandpa's. I knew where it was since I was nosey even at five. To make Christina like me I had to get her a good present for her party. Money was my answer, so I took fifteen dollars out of Mama's savings and gave it to my best friend at her party. I did not realize that would seem like a huge gift coming from a five year old. It did and here comes her mom to the door with the money and I was busted. I was caught stealing from my Mama to impress my friend. Impressing is something that has caused me to be dishonest a few times in my life. It always got me in trouble. Something else I have gathered along the way. I have a scar to prove the zeal had when it came to trying to fit in with others. Doing things we were forbidden to do was something for some reason we just had to do. There were abandoned houses in the neighborhood. The one we decided to play in was still full of all of the belongings of the previous tenents. There were all the toys, clothes and house wares left for us to dig through. I still have one of the small dolls that we found in that house. One of the days, actually the last day I found a treasure. It was a pick plastic wall plaque to hang in a bathroom. This was great to go in the playhouse we had at the time. I ran to show Christina my find and jumped off the back step falling onto a broken bottle. I landed on the bottle with my elbow. It was cut very deep. I had to run home an be taken to the doctor for stitches. This was the first of many stitches that I would recieve. Grandpa drove me in his Galaxy 500 all the way fussing because we were playing in the abandoned house. He did not think that my deep cut at my left elbow was too, serious. He did agree with Grandma that it needed to have stitches. I myself thought it was life threatening. This was my very first really deep cut. The scar on my elbow is still there almost as vivid as the memory of the house and that day.
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