Random Memories About Some Of My Girls

Random Memories About Some Of My Girls: The West Coast and Florida Edition

My gorgeous and talented BFF Lani (please go vote for her here in all the categories her blog "IlyanaLanai.com" is nominated for) fell into hetero lust with a hot hostess at the Union Square Cafe, where we used to always go. After watching her longing glances for half an hour, I finally decided to go pick the woman up for her. I came back to the table with the hostess (Mandy) in tow and introduced her to Lani and my friend Jeff who was also there, then got her number. Mandy and Lani eventually also became bestest friends. Lani and I were stoked (yes, stoked) because now we'd found a third for our Sex and the City-style outings but never found a fourth.

Jessica (my best friend growing up) and I used to play War with her brothers when we were kids. We would put on old clothes or cammies and then split up into teams. They had an above ground pool surrounded by bushes and tall grass in their backyard, and we'd crawl around, using hand signals to communicate. Each person had a toy machine gun that shot these heavy yellow rubber bullets that stung if you were at close range. Jessie didn't have a gun though, and I can't remember what she used instead. It could have been a water pistol, a gun that didn't actually shoot anything or maybe she just threw rocks at us. At night, we'd sleep in a tent in her backyard and wait for little frogs to jump onto the outside of the tent then BOINK them off. We'd actually say "Boink" as we were doing it. Once, her brothers wouldn't let us play in the huge fort they'd dug out beside the train tracks behind their house, so me and Jessie dug our own. Except we could barely fit in it at the same time, and eventually the boys started using it as an outhouse.

(L-R) Me, Jessie and her twin Mike in 1977, Jess and me on a camping
trip to Lake Mead in 1984, Jess and her bridesmaids in 1997

In the ninth grade, Lety and I were part of this crew of five girls that we used to call "The LULAS" (Love U Like A Sis). In the next year, the only people who hadn't stabbed each other in the back were me and Lety. I had dumped my boyfriend Jason because I felt bad for not really being into him. Lety however, thought he was cute so I told everyone I was going to fix them up. And then one of our Lulas blew him on a skiing trip. Lety and I hadn't even seen a penis yet, much less contemplated putting one in our mouths. The girl was twelve. Another of our Lulas kissed two of Lety's boyfriends, then slept with the guy she'd been in love with for years. Another one got her Mexican gangbanger friends to try and jump me, because she thought I was moving in on her ex-boyfriend. The guy used to drunk dial me at 3am reciting poetry, then leave four-page love letters in my locker using gang writing (you know, that shit they tag in on freeway signs and overpasses). Right, yeah I'm totally going for that.

My beautiful sister Leah was always a really shy and quiet kid, something that may shock her friends now when she's going on about festering anal warts. One of my proudest memories of her, was when she was around 9 or 10 and had to perform in the school Christmas program. At the time she was very introvertive and would never really let us hear her sing. She stepped up to the podium, this quiet little girl, and sang "O'Holy Night" in front of about 300 people. She literally brought the entire audience to its feet. People were in awe, cheering and applauding. Her voice was so powerful and beautiful, I actually cried.

Elena, another one of my best friends growing up, and I met in the 5th grade but didn't like each other for reasons we couldn't figure out even later. I wasn't very happy in general, having been transfered into a magnet school and going from waking up at 7:30 in the morning to waking up at 5 a.m. to catch a bus. In between 5th and 6th grade, everyone was required to attend a month-long class at USC and Elena and I were assigned seats next to each other. Becoming her friend literally changed everything for me, I actually started looking forward to school. We used to have brownie fights and wake up the next day with brownie caked into our hair. When she was 16 and I was 15, we were in East L.A. and two cops pulled over the truck she was driving. We both started freaking out because:

a) She didn't have a license.
b) The truck wasn't insured or registered.
c) The truck had no seat belts.
d) The truck had a broken tail light.
e) There was an open botle of liquor under the seat (not ours).
d) We were way past curfew.

When Elena saw that the two cops walking to each of our windows were young, she told me to start flirting like hell. Which we did. They didn't run anything, because they were just on the lookout for two female car thieves and knew off the bat it wasn't us. We gave them fake numbers. Fuck. I just realized why I have two daughters.