It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. No, it was the best of times. It was the early 80’s, Utah, I was in fifth grade, and I had a very best friend who happened to be of Iranian descent. She was American, born and raised, but her father I believe was originally from Iran and I remember she had told me that he had fled Iran before the Shah gained control of the country. It was all very fascinating to me. Besides that, she and I used to have the best of times, as fifth graders often do.

Times you could say were simpler then, it was the early 80’s, I know dating myself! But we used to lay outside on the grass in her yard during those warm languid summers and stare at the clouds. She used to imagine that if you stare long enough at them, you could make them move. I thought I saw that once. I even tried it myself. Not sure if I got them to move or not. But I tried.

She would do this strange thing where she would eat the flowers on the side of the road. I thought that one was a little crazy, but if look up herbs and natural remedies, flowers are actually considered a health food. But it didn’t matter what she did, ’cause she was my friend. We were bosom buddies, nothing could tear us apart at that time.

She and I were so close in fact, that one time, we decided to instigate a ‘Blood Sisterhood’ she went as far as to prick her finger and she said, now you do it. But I couldn’t, even though I wanted to, but I just thought that was going a little far, especially since I watched a lot of medical and science shows and was a little too quivery in that area. But we were still friends even so.

There was one time that somehow we got the idea to build our own log cabin out of stalks of wheat-like material and mud and water. There was an abundance of wheat-like stalks that grew around the area, just next to my family’s house actually, as there was a vacant lot there for a long time, as long as I lived there anyway, and it was like my own field of wheat right in my backyard. So with those stalks of wheat and the combination of mud and water, Hilary and I actually got about two feet done of the ‘log cabin.’ But we soon found out just how hard it was to build a cabin out of stalks of wheat and we gave up after a while. It was worth a try though. The things children will do.