Judy, another kid only a few months older than me. She was going to open up a new world to me. Her mother had died of heart disease about a year earlier. In a lot of ways she was my opposite. I was small, skinny, and homebound because it was too easy for me to get lost. Judy was short but plump and totally developed even in the fifth grade when her mother passed. The little boys made fun of her. She could not stop talking, to this day she still can not stop, she talks to herself even in the night. So she was always in trouble, the grade school teachers called her 'that little animal.' But Judy had and has a heart of gold, non judgmental, and positive. She talked constantly but I couldn't remember much of what she said and I soon learned to not listen. Actually, one day I wrote down the theme of what she was saying and discovered she would talk about ten things and then start over and repeat them, and then repeat the series again. So if I listened until she started the repeat I knew what to expect and so I didn't have to listen. If I said 'hmmm,' or 'yah', or any sound now and then she was happy as a clam, even on the phone, I would lay it down and now and then pick it up and make a sound and she was happy.
How she opened the world to me was her single dad father always supplied her with a good bicycle and she peddled all over the town. I had an old one speed but I could keep up with her. My world enlarged to the size of the city. We would bike 20 to 30 miles on the weekend days. She never got lost, I had no idea where I was but slowly, very slowly I began to get the feel of the land. We bike to this day, all around the city to the surrounding cities. Most of the time I have no idea where we are and I call her the navigator. I also had a friend to share ideas with who never passed judgement. My oldest brother was in college when I was in seventh grade and he shared some of his text books with me. I especially enjoyed the biology of cells. I would draw from his books and outline what he told me and Judy and I would go up into the attic rooms of her house and I would put on a lecture of what my brother had taught me. I could remember because science was logical. Judy could care less but sat through it. I was learning how to process and organize materials. It was a blessing to me. When I was allowed to take biology in the 9th grade I was the top student. I was totally lost in subjects my brother had not gone over with me. I could not see the outline and there were no pictures. Those two tricks had become my road to the world. And I had a companion who would put up with me so I could practice. BUT there was more experiences she drug me through that would have a profound effect and affect on me.
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