My Best Friend from High School

Last night I spoke with Linda. Wow, she sounded great. I had not spoken to her in years but her voice and her fantastic laugh were exactly the same. She was my very best friend in high school and probably the most important thing that happened to me in my four years at Our Lady of Wisdom Academy. Not that OLWA was a bad school because it wasn't. It is just the fact that my attendance there was based on fear.
What could I possibly mean, you ask yourself.
So here is the story - I was one of two girls in my 8th grade class at St. Michael's School in East New York, Brooklyn to have been accepted in the Catholic Diocesan High School for girls, Bishop McDonald. It was considered a great honor and it was completely tuition free. It was also considered prestigious and had a reputation of having all the top notch teachers from the entire area. There were nuns of many different orders doing the teaching; and it was perceived as having a more liberal philosophy. But - and this was the decisive but - the school was located in Downtown Brooklyn and required a subway ride into the "bowels" of Brooklyn. My father would have no part of it. He saw dangers lurking all around and did not want his little girl to disappear beneath the streets of Brooklyn. By this time in my life I had already had enough years of fear drummed into me so I didn't even fight the decision. Sad, huh? I would go instead in the opposite direction and take the Atlantic Avenue bus into Queens to attend Our Lady of Wisdom Academy with my cousin, Nancy, who had started at OLWA a year earlier. It was assumed that Nancy could "protect" me and show me the ropes.
I have always regretted that I did not take that other path into the excitement and dangers of Brooklyn. I still believe that Bishop McDonald was the correct choice for me but FEAR pushed me down another roadway. It was just one incident of many where fear interfered with my life decisions. I still battle the fear enemy to this day. Nonetheless, I met Linda and if I had gone elsewhere to school I would not have met her. Thanks Linda, for being such a special friend at a crucial time in my life. We all need a special, loving, funny, kind friend when we are 13 years old and Linda was all that for me!
Mary Beth