Memories of Gloria

I hadn't seen Gloria for many, many years, but I did get a letter from her a few years ago, wanting to know how I was doing.
She was a grade school chum of mine and we were good friends. She even beat up a skinny little kid that teased me. Yes, I asked her to! She gave him a bloody nose, and he never teased me again. Now that's what I call a good friend!! (kidding)

In her letter, Gloria said she had driven her motor home all by herself from somewhere in the West to Montana where one of her
daughters lived. Gloria also mentioned that she had some type of heart trouble. I answered her letter, but sadly, never heard from her again.

Gloria had married a man much older than she was, and so became a widow too soon. Together, they raised pure-bred horses in Illinois. Gloria was a pharmacist and her husband was a civil engineer. Pretty good for a little fatherless girl, raised on welfare with a mother that made her wear high-topped shoes when she was in grade school. Her mother had a shot gun handy in case you weren't welcome on her property.

Gloria played the violin and the clarinet. She said the father who had walked out on the family of three children was a lawyer. Knowing Gloria's mother, that was just not easy to believe. (think: Ma Kettle) In high school, Gloria didn't pay much attention to me anymore, because she was
doing her darndest to get in with the "Fifth Avenue" crowd. But I think they snubbed her because of her background. She just
disappeared from the scene after that, and I don't know much about her life. I never went to any high school class reunions for just exactly that reason (snobs), so I didn't learn till much later what she was up to.

Gloria was a really nice, smart person, and I am sorry that we were not life-long friends. And I think she had the same thought
about me when she wrote me that last letter.