I met Theresa in sixth grade, even at that young age, she was already a force to be reckoned with and she terrified me down to my core. How could I have known the impact she would come to have on my life when, later that year, my parents bought our first house and it happened to be directly across the street from the house where Theresa lived.
It was the summer of 1976 and I would be heading into Junior High in September. While my parents had the tough job of moving our family a second time in four years, my sisters and I went to stay with a favorite Aunt and Uncle for a week. On the plane ride home it occurred to me that for the second time in my life, “home” was no longer where I’d been living and I would need to get used to a whole new neighborhood and surroundings and this new place was a stones’ throw away from the one person who terrified me.
Theresa was the tallest girl in the sixth grade, she had fights with boys and would win, she was the first girl I ever heard say the “f” word (and it rolled off her tongue like she was used to saying it at the breakfast table over a bowl of Cheerios). It was rumored she already smoked cigarettes and she was more proud of her Italian heritage than anyone I’d ever known. In sharp contrast, I was the smallest girl in our grade, I ran faster than any of the boys and never thought of hitting them, I was the child of two smokers and hated everything about smoking, and at that time in my life, I wouldn’t have said, “shit,” if I had a mouthful of it.
Everything changed that summer.
The very first time I saw Theresa in my new neighborhood she was running away from her mother and yelling over her shoulder that she promised not to go swimming in the “crick.” I wasn’t sure what a crick was, but it turns out she was talking about the creek at the end of our street that was the boundry line between the county we lived in, Allegheny County and Beaver County. She was wearing cut off blue jeans, a blue and red striped rugby shirt with a white collar (and rubber buttons) and she was barefoot. I learned soon after that Theresa took her shoes off sometime in April and didn’t put them back on until the first snow fall. Theresa’s mother was no taller than 5 feet, she was 90 pounds soaking wet and as she yelled after Theresa, you could tell she was exhausted and she knew that in a little less than an hour, her middle daughter was going to return home soaking wet. That’s exactly what happened.
A girl who lived two doors away and was a year older than I was came over and asked me if I’d like to go for a walk so she could fill me in on the goings-on in this part of town. She was sweet with a soft voice and killer dimples. She wasn’t the kind of person I normally hung around, she was popular and a cheerleader but she came to be an important part of my life. She told me stories as we passed by every house on the short walk down to the creek and by the time we arrived, I knew more about the residents of that tiny town and knew I would have a tough time looking some of them in the eye, one day when I would formally meet them. She was an awesome tour guide and I couldn’t help comparing her to the Love Boat character, Julie McCoy, Cruise Director. They both had upbeat personalities and their smiles were alike, too; I think it was the dimples.
As we arrived at the famous creek all that could be heard was laughing, voices and splashes of water. We walked through a small path and came to a clearing that immediately became a favorite spot I would return to over the next several years I would live there. The span of water from one side of the creek to the other, in my memory was massive. Across, on the opposite side there was a stone wall that was crumbling into the water, exposing pipes that held who-knows-what! On the side that we were standing on there was a gradual slope of dirt that went into the water gradually. The swimming hole was shaded by really old trees, one which, from it, hung a rope swing that could swing out to where you could let go and be in the water safely. This place was a kid’s dream. It was almost magical to my 12 year old mind and not once did I consider the hundreds of creepy crawly things that were dangling from the tree branches or swimming in the water. Over the years that I lived at that address I would find great comfort in sitting at the creek’s edge, dreaming about what my life will become and having a few minutes to myself to contemplate life’s mysteries. I would miss this place, and although I’d look, I’d never find a spot like that again, in my lifetime.
As we entered the clearing I could see Theresa neck deep in the water with three boys from our class. Not just any boys, but the three most popular boys! I had a sense that Theresa and these boys had been friends since kindergarten and that they were really close. I was right, of course, and no matter how I tried, I could never have that same level friendship with any of them.
What I didn’t realize at that time was that every single male who lived in our neighborhood was head-over-heels in love with Theresa and she was completely oblivious to this. Maybe she knew; but if she did, she never exploited that fact and even through our raging hormone days of adolescence, never played with the emotions of these young men.
As soon as the gang of kids came to be aware of our presence, the greatest thing happened, I was welcomed immediately. It were as if they had been waiting for me to show up at this place all summer. It was a great feeling and one that I would cherish forever.
Theresa came out of the water, still wearing the short sleeved rugby shirt and cut off jeans and walked over to us to say hi. She looked down (she was a foot taller than I was) at me and said, “It’s about time you got here, Dee. I was starting to wonder if your parents sold you to someone up in Boston, or if you were really going to live here.”
I remember the feeling of acceptance that I was flooded with at that moment and for a 12 year old girl, nothing could have made me happier than to be accepted by this awesome group of friends. Theresa never called me, Jill, she always called me, Dee. I always called her, Tee, after that and I could be anywhere, at a Little League game, a school dance, or graduation and I would hear her deep voice call out, “Dee,” and I’d know that my friend was watching out for me.
I lived in that house for six years and then graduated high school. A year later I left to start my airline career in Long Island, New York. There wasn’t a day that went by where Theresa, the girl who’d terrified me at one time, wasn’t a part of my life. It’s also no coincidence that whenever I was grounded, or in trouble, it was because I’d been with Theresa! For this little, skinny girl from Boston, one of the best friends I’ve ever had, was the Italian girl who beat up boys, swore and smoked as far back as I can remember.
Once Theresa and I became friends, my life would never be the same again.
And I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.
