Maybe it’s different now, what with parents arranging “play dates” and similar activities. But when I was a kid, these things (looking back on them now) seemed to develop haphazardly, utterly by chance, with friendships forming and disappearing like condensation on the inside of a window…
I have dim memories of my very first friendships, because those boys moved away within a year of my meeting them. (I remember, specifically, a name — Craig Brashear — although I’m not sure of the spelling, and no longer recall if he was the one who lived on Walnut Street or the one who lived on… was it Edgewood Avenue? Oakford? Craig, are you out there?)
But I do have specific memories of my friend Ron: I think he was the first one I started hanging out with on my own, rather than as a mob of boys who’d gather (say) in the Clipsham family’s side yard to play football.
