Serving a pallbearer for my former best friend led me to start this blog or collection of writing. Nathan was remembered at funeral presided over by preachers. My end will not be like that but I do want a way for people who have known me to connect up the way I did at that funeral.

My idea was to write about what I think and my life from time to time–mainly in the dark winter months when I am more likely to be indoors. I have included various specimens of written self so far. My idea was that it will be a public face for me after I die, but sometimes people stumble onto my online existence in current time.

Recently a dear friend from about age thirteen left a comment, having stumbling across my name on this WordPress site at danielforrest.org. Jimmy remembers me from that age and then his memories stop because he moved away and we never saw each other again.

Jimmy and I both had crew cuts back in that age of astronauts. He lived in a blonde brick home across from my Uncle Earle’s house. It had a carport on the righthand side.

We palled around, played basketball, and talked the way thirteen-year-olds do. I remember his easy smile and gentile disposition as much as I remember his personal form. What I remember most was an embarrassing situation.

I think I spent the night at his house and wanted him to spend the night at mine. He came over and we started out on what was a big deal at that age but the overnight was aborted. My father and mother got into a big fight over my dad’s drinking. There was noise and more. The details are gone but I know that Jimmy could not stay with me and I was embarrassed.

He was a good friend at a crucial time in my life and I still see his smiling face in my head. His leaving a comment for me about something I wrote touches me. The older I get the less I seem to exist in the way I did when I was younger and working. I do not have a regular wide audience.

He confirms to me when I need it that I am still here and count for something to people in general. Thanks, Jimmy. He also connects me to Donna.

She, too, left a comment. Unlike Jimmy I remember her cousin. We both remember Donna. Seems we were both in love with her.

I have always been shy and am more an introvert than not, though I can get quite wound up on a few cups of coffee. At thirteen I attempted to connect to Donna who was a kind of teen goddess to Jimmy and me. Brenda facilitated the connection.

Donna had beautiful golden skin and, like Jimmy, a bright white smile. I loved looking into her eyes but was afraid to hold her gaze. She had thick light brown curly hair and a beautiful figure. She was gorgeous.

My mind goes to seeing her and Brenda at a picnic table at the swimming pool across from the diving board at the end of the log dressing room. I think she and Brenda were sitting under an umbrella. Donna had on a two piece bathing suit–my mind says it was green or lime and checkered.

She is so stunning and I am so pleased to just be in her presence that I can not think of what to say and do. Man oh man would I love to travel back to that time to see our young selves. Two cute girls and my stumbling gangly self.

I think I expressed myself in some letters–not sure–and I do remember holding on to the idea that she would be my girlfriend. I remember once I got a car driving go Joanna, SC, to see her but not summoning the confidence to do so.

At 71 I see the importance of living in someone’s mind. Donna and Jimmy live in my mind and that they remember my young self delights me. Remembering them takes me out of my COVID funk and reminds me that I still have an audience. I exist in memory.