Published: May 02, 2008 05:04 pm         

Time travels fast through phone

The Back Porch column

“What’re you doin’?”

That question from an elementary school friend dissolved the more than 30 years that had passed since we spoke to or saw each other.

I was transported back to the playground at Greenville Elementary. She and I were sitting on the top layer of what we called the monkey bars — it was actually a series of connected metal cubes one could climb through. I was explaining that I would be moving down the road into Summers County and would not be attending school at Greenville.

I thought my world as I knew it was ending. Our family was excited about the move into a farmhouse and the thought of working level acreage. It was possible to fall off parts of our farm on Indian Draft Road because it was so steep.

But I would be leaving my friend behind.

Fast forward three decades. “I’m sitting here talking to you,” I answered with a laugh.

And off we went into a 30-minute conversation that did a pretty good job of covering those three missing decades. I’d heard she was sick. I knew I needed to call her but dreaded it.

How do you drop back into somebody’s life after all that time? I once read that time and distance don’t matter in great friendships because those friends can pick up where they left off whether it’s 30 minutes or 30 years since they last talked.

So I dialed the number and waited as the phone rang and rang. Just when I had resigned myself to leaving a phone message, she answered.

One of the casualties of living a gypsy lifestyle is constantly starting over to make new friends. While that can be invigorating and rewarding, it’s sad to lose touch with the old friends, the ones who remember your youth the way you do.

I’m a little jealous of my parents because they have a lifelong friendship as part of their marriage. They grew up together, remember the same stories and personalities and can answer each other’s questions when one’s memory loses a detail.

I have acquaintances scattered across the country, but none of them can go back to the playground at Greenville Elementary with me and sit in the tractor tire sandbox. They don’t remember sitting on the stools in the old cafeteria and eating brown beans and cornbread.

Maybe it’s because I’m getting older, but those things seem more important now. I’m more settled than I’ve been in six years, but it seems like something is missing.

So I made the phone call. And we talked. She said she, too, felt like her world was ending when I announced the move. She didn’t say so at the time. Things we couldn’t say as 10-year-olds we had no problem sharing now as 40-somethings.

Before I hung up the phone, I promised I would call again. I will.

Maybe you have somebody in your life from bygone days from whom time, distance or disagreement has separated you. Maybe that person just wants to know what you’re doing.

Pick up the phone. Make the call. It’s a good day to meet on the playground.

— Young is a Register-Herald columnist. E-mail: ynerissa@verizon.net

© 2008 by Nerissa Young