They took me by the hand and led me to her

like characters from some 80's rock ballad. It was Good Friday in 1983. I can't imagine that my Mom & Dad let me not go to school, but there was some huge Baptist youth thing in Little Rock. And if it was Baptist, it had to be good. I went with my church.

Kevin and Ken are brothers. I've lost touch with them, but in 1984 was friends with them. Or at least friends at school. I would have just met them a few months before. Years later, I would remember the event, but not the time. She would remember it was Good Friday. She had gone with friends and their church.

In an auditorium in a large convention hotel in Little Rock, the two brothers found me with my church group, took me one by each hand, and dragged me to their church group to meet her. Sat me down in an open seat right beside her.

I don't know how long I stayed there. I'm sure it was incredibly awkward, amplified by the 9th grade-ness of it all. I'm not sure how we became friends, we lived in different school districts and went to different schools and pretty much lived apart.

Until somehow, one weekend, it snapped, and there we were, hanging out every weekend. I would go and get her or she would go and get me, and we'd spend the weekends dragging Cherry and doing whatever kids did in small towns.

We would be friends until about 1993. We had a . . . slight disagreement. . . . and did not speak several years. Then one day I came home on my birthday, hit "play" on the answering machine, and sunk to the floor. It was her voice wishing me a happy birthday. It was close to ten years. We've never spoken of it since, it's as if that period was just a time when we were too busy to call, and then one day one of us called.

We don't see each other so much now. We still live in different cities. We talk some, text some, etc. I ran into her in Target a few weeks ago by coincidence, she was in town spoiling her niece and nephew. We exchange holiday cards. On the morning of Good Friday, I had a text message from her. She should have received a card in the mail from me.

It's nice to know she's out there, reachable. And it's fun to remember how we met on Good Friday in 1984.