synchronized choreography on wheels

ariel had a photo collage of leonardo dicaprio on her bedroom wall, which she kissed daily. i didn't understand the practice, or the attraction. jonathan taylor thomas, on the other hand, was dreamy enough to swim through my thoughts on the reg. we would sit on her lower bunk, my sister and i, and revel in her tales of sixth grade public school, boys, silly girl drama. she passed on hand-me-downs, purple pleather mini skirts and halter tops, which we weren't allowed to wear out of the house but kept for years, playing tween skank dress-up. ariel's the one who stripped down her ken and barbie to the nude, "sixty-nining" them, to my confusion. why would anyone purposely put their face down there? that's not the way babies are made!

we'd guiltily watch banned tv shows, like simpsons, are you afraid of the dark, and saved by the bell, eating gushers and drinking orbitz. ariel always had fun food. my house had responsible snacks: pretzels and peanut butter, ants on a log, carrot sticks and cheddar cheese on saltines. we'd eagerly bike over to her house in our one-piece speedos right when she got home from school, sometimes slyly changing into one of her bikinis for maximum tanning action. her pool was a focal point of our summers, when we weren't biking up and down estabrook circle, a quiet street lined with tiny houses.

i knew almost all my neighbors, though there were few children. jess lived in the big house away from the street; she was a few years younger, but a trampoline in her backyard warranted instant neighborhood popularity. she had things like spice world on cassette and frozen pizzas that also made her house worth visiting, though i was scared of her older brothers, especially when they'd double bounce us, way too high. i found out in recent years that though we were jealous of her freedom as raised by a single mom, she found our family intriguing and welcoming. she wrote in a high school essay about our family dinners, six of us around the living room table, bowed heads and thanks before the meal. the fact that we invited her into this tradition night after night meant more than i ever realized.

clearly, my standout neighbor memories are of the foolish, the trivial; flashes of celebrities and pop culture that were experienced outside my home. of course, i could tell countless stories of home-schooled country fun, playing house, writing plays, building forts, and swimming in lakes. those times have run together, but at some point maybe i'll be able to catalogue them and do them proper justice. another time...