Someone asked me not too long ago, what do I remember from the ‘60s?


 I remember a girl, 'a pearl of girl', with a funny laugh, a killer smile, and funky sunglasses she wore as much as possible. I remember walking for miles before I had a car, while the girl and I never stopped talking about books and movies, with lots of giggling. I remember sitting in a dingy theater, almost a grindhouse, with the girl shouting out scandalous lines from other movies rather than listen to the dialog, and then scrunching down next to me so the few others there might mistake me for the heckler. I remember the way she looked in a sundress on a bright spring day, as she smiled up at me and went rolling down the long, grassy hill, laughing and whooping all the way to the bottom. I remember pulling grass out of her long, dark hair for half an hour after I got to the bottom myself. I remember her weeping as she told me about her brother after he returned from 'Nam, how she was shut out from grief by her stoically uncaring family, and how she had to tell someone, so she chose me. I remember the front of my shirt was damp with her tears that day, but I had broad shoulders so I could take it, until she stopped crying and just trembled, and I remember how useless I felt. I remember I hugged her once or twice in the whole time I knew her, and I remember she kissed my cheek once or twice, and that's all the physical affection twixt us I remember. Mostly, tho, I remember when no matter how low I felt, with only a few words, that girl had a knack for making me feel like a million bucks - that girl was one of the most true friends I ever had. That's what I remember most from the '60s – I remember a girl.