When my mother passed away a couple of years ago, and we had a viewing at a local funeral home, I was reminded of how far back some of my friendships went: from age four in the neighborhood and church, through Hickory Heights Elementary, a combination of three elementary schools for 5th and 6th grades at Eastbrook, all of us graduating together from Laurel in 1968. A couple of the “kids” strayed the path with divorced parents, but they always came back.

Reading through the obituaries the other day and recognizing an elder friend from Peaks Island, where I lived for 37 years as an adult, I decided to pull out the book she and four old friends had published: “Glimpses of Old Peaks Island through Rose-Colored Glasses.” Alice Boyce passed away at 92. All five island authors grew up on Peaks and stayed throughout their adult lives. In 2009 they decided to write a book together. I reread Alice Boyce’s contribution about her experiences with her friends through World War II and many other changes.

She had been a boat buddy of mine and my 2-year-old son when I took him to town for childcare in our first couple of years on Peaks Island. She followed him through his childhood and adolescence from a place of interest and caring.

My son ended up spending his school years with the same group of “kids” like she had 70 years earlier: first in the childcare center, the island elementary school, then riding the ferry to middle school and high school. Although widely dispersed in their adult lives, their friendships have lasted from those years of childhood bonding.

I permanently moved away from my hometown in my 20s, but my best friend for life was my next-door neighbor, beginning when we were 13. During the summer months, we spent our days riding our bikes down Lakewood Road with no hands, breaking the tar bubbles seeping out of the tar and chip pavement, ending up at Lakewood, a small entertainment establishment with a dammed-up creek for swimming.

The swimming area was deep enough for a high diving board, and there was a sandy beach. We would swim out to a wooden float built on empty barrels that served us for sun-bathing, shallow dives, underwater swimming contests, flirtation and friendships.

In the winter we found ourselves on the same water body, but on ice. A shed with a pot belly stove was hauled in every fall before the snow began to fall. Once the ice formed, a wooden ramp leading from the shed gave us access to the ice, which was replenished daily with a layer of water that froze before nightfall when the skating began. The same group of “kids” showed nightly up with sharpened blades.

Many of those “kids” also showed up at my mother’s viewing with hugs, kisses and understanding that could only come from old friends. It felt like I had never left town.

— Special to the Telegram

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