Angie was, I thought, the coolest girl in school. There were a couple other girls I thought were pretty cool, too, but there was something special about Angie. She seemed to always know what to say and what to do at all the right times.
Looking back on it now, I’m sure she had her moments of doubt and insecurity, but you could never tell by the way she handled herself. She always seemed happy and didn’t seem to care what others thought of her. I wanted to be just like her.
A note to Angie:
We weren’t the best of friends, but we weren’t the worst of friends, either. I don’t blame you for that, I know you tried. It’s really hard to maintain a friendship with someone with absolutely no personality. In many ways, though, you were my best friend in grade school.
I know that my perceptions of you during these years are going to be different than your perceptions of you, but I want you to know that you were a positive influence in my life. This is the way I remember you:
You always knew what you wanted and you didn’t let anyone tell you what to do or how to do it. I’m not talking about taking instruction form teachers, I’m talking about how you were with our classmates. Everyone was your friend, or wanted to be. You were confident and secure. If someone didn’t like what you did or said, that was fine. It didn’t make a difference to you.
Sometimes that attitude seemed a little mean, but it wasn’t something you held onto. You never seemed to hold a grudge. You weren’t ever mean just to be mean, you just didn’t care if others liked what you were doing. I wanted to be like that so badly! I wanted not to care what anyone thought of me. I was always afraid people wouldn’t like me if I didn’t care, though.
You could do anything. Everything you tried, just worked out. It always seemed to me that you could never fail.
You knew more about life than anyone I had ever met. You were up to date on the latest music and styles. You seemed to know everything about everything! The one time I spent the night with you, I listened to all kinds of music I had never heard before. I thought that was so cool! To this day, I still recall hearing Only the Good Die Young for the first time at your house. It became my favorite song. Billy Joel is still one of my very favorite musicians.
Throughout all the years since we were in school together, I have never forgotten you. Even though I never felt good enough to be your friend, I never felt like you thought I wasn’t good enough. Whenever you were around, I felt like I had a friend. Even though I never felt like I belonged in any group, I didn’t feel quite as much of an outsider when you were around.
Thank you for being who you are. Knowing you for that short time in 4th and 5th grades made a positive difference in my life!