Walking

In an earlier post I lamented about not having a car during high school, but when looked at another way it wasn't always bad. I think at one time or another I walked at least part of the way to or from the high school with almost everybody who lived in that part of town.

The ones I can think of are:

Allen McNabb
Wayne McNabb
Doug Christian
Mike Delaney
Freddie Lindsey
Jerry Jones
Edward Watson
Mack McNew
Ricky Mitchell
Larry Lankford
Scott Thornburg (a year ahead of us)
James Wilson (a year ahead of us)
Sandra Ward
Sue Crisp
Liz Morgan (Donna's little sister)

Given a little more time, I could probably add others to this list.

Obviously this changed as more and more people got cars, so there were more walkers freshman year than senior year.

In the last couple of years, walking sometimes included stops by the A&W, especially when it was hot. I still like a mug of cold root beer, but now it's diet. :)

I remember a fight after school once between me and Mike Delaney, or more specifically a going-to-be fight. Like most fights it was mostly talk. One of us didn't really want to fight and the other one was glad of it, but you still had to put on a show of words for everybody who showed up to watch. Wayne, Allen, Larry, Scott and Freddy were all there, and that makes it a very melancholy memory. Scott didn't make it back from Vietnam and the other 4 plus Mike are all gone now too.

I remember other friends honking their horn as they drove past us. I think that was partly to say hi, and partly to say "Look at me, I'm drivin'" :)

It also didn't hurt to be seen walking with a girl either. The ones I walked with were all strictly platonic (much more from thier choice than mine, I'm sure) but it was good for the ego to have one of the guys say something like, "Hey, I saw you and so and so walking home yesterday. You got something going with her?" Heck, they knew the answer to that question without asking, but it was part of the ritual to ask because at some point I had to ask them the same question when I already knew the answer too. :)

Never has my life been so simple, yet so complicated.