I had a longtime friend I met in college. I was standing outside the lecture hall, talking to a friend, waiting for the professor to come open the door so we could take our communication law final. Donna, who apparently knew the person I was talking to, but had no clue who I was, ran up in between us while we were talking, turned to me and said, "Tell me everything you know, NOW." Rodd laughed and I thought that took guts and one thing led to another and we got to be friends.

After college, I had my little interlude in Texas -- the only good thing that year produced was my son. I was living on a friend's couch, was making $3.35 an hour at McDonald's, and couldn't take it anymore, so I called one of my old roommates who lived in St. Louis (where my parents had moved while I was in TX) and asked if I could stay with her for a while. She said sure.

My mom sent me my savings bonds to cash in and I bought a $140 train ticket to St. Louis, and there I was. My dad came to pick me up at the station. I hadn't spoken to my parents for about a year and had left home in a very bad place.

I got to Beth's, which lasted about 6 weeks before they (she was married) got sick of me sleeping on their couch. So off to my parents' it was. They made me so f'ing miserable -- I paid them more rent than I paid for my first apartment, they wanted in a say in who I had over and when I could come home, etc -- that I swore to myself I would sleep in a cardboard box on a sidewalk grate before I would EVER ask my parents for help again. I got a job, figured out to the exact day when I would be able to move out, and that is the exact day I moved.

Donna came over the night I got to my parents'. They were going out, so we ordered pizza and watched videos and chatted. We met in college in 1987. I moved home in December 1988. Between then and the time I left for grad school in Milwaukee in 1999, we were inseparable. We saw each other through bad relationships, each lost a parent to cancer, were shopping buddies, I helped her buy her first computer and teach her how to use it. In other words, we had a history.

A couple of years ago, I sent her an email she objected to. She said that just because she'd done something I didn't like a couple of times, I shouldn't bring it up again every time the same situation came up. I called her a hypocrite, which she was, because she would always come back to a situation that happened in 1987 and not let me free of it, or admit that I was a different person in 2002 than I was in 1987.

That was the end of it. Haven't heard from her since. Have thought about getting back in touch, but I sit and ask myself, "Do I really want to bother?" Because truthfully, she was really hard to be friends with. She's a very angry person, and very narrow-minded, and you have to walk on eggshellls around her all the time because you never know what will set her off.

So I think about: Friend for nearly 2 decades .... vs. .... do I really need this? I want to get in touch with her just to say, "You know, I kind of miss you. Have you changed any?" ;-) She was always wonderful with my grief over my son and I would like to share with her the joy of finding him this year. I think about that a lot. But I keep thinking about how much harder it was to be her friend than to just let it go.

I got a Christmas card today from someone I've known since 5th grade. I also got one from my 8th grade social studies teacher, and from my next-door neighbor from ages 3 to 18. I'm in touch with no one from high school and 1 person from college, one person from an old job, and my dearest, truest friends I have found in the 7 years I've lived in Milwaukee. Old friends can be lovely -- but newer ones can be just as good, and they have the added benefit of the maturing you did in the years before you met them, so that you have a better chance of having healthy relationships.

WHEW. Sorry for rambling. Hope it made some sense.

Candy