The One Hundred

Welcome to a new feature here at The One Hundred. It will be as frequent as the rest of our features (which is to say not frequent. At all. Not even a little.) and we hope you like it. The common thread here is the retelling of events, good or bad, that are just outside the reach of full remembrance. They live on the Edge of Memory.

There once was a girl named Yolanda. I can’t remember her last name and, truth be told, I’m not even sure that her first name was actually Yolanda — but that’s what I remember so I’m going with it.

This must have been around the second grade or so, because my memory is telling me that the following event happened right across the street from Johnny’s Neighborhood Market. Again, just going on memory here. Could be that this was not in fact the name of the store — but it was around the corner from Oakley School, down the alley from Our Lady of Perpetual Help, and a few streets over from the house where I grew up. This much, I know.

I can still see her if I close my eyes. She must have been from a racially mixed family. She wasn’t quite Mexican and she wasn’t quite African-American either — but you could see the contributions from both races in her. She had really pretty eyes — almost a light blue or green. So different from the brown eyes that resided in the heads of just about everyone else. They were her most striking feature. I recall her having to wear a brace — one of those metal jobs, like lil’ Forrest Gump — on her leg for some reason. But only on some days, not always. I also remember her being tough. Like, you didn’t want to mess with her, she’s-already-been-in-a-few-fights-and-we’re-only-in-the-second-grade-and-I’m-pretty-sure-at-least-one-of-those-was-in-a-bar tough. She may have had a tattoo, but I could never be sure. I mention her toughness because it almost makes me second guess what I remember her wearing. Almost.

She’s wearing a pink and white dress with those shiny black dress shoes that seemed so popular for girls back then. You know which ones I’m talking about — so shiny they might as well be mirrors because you could see yourself in them and a they had a buckle. These shoes always had a buckle. I don’t know if it was a Mexican thing or not but coming from a Mexican family, I only have one frame of reference and let me tell you, every single one of my female cousins (and my sister) had at least one pair of those in their life time. Take from that what you will.

Did I mention that she was riding a bike? Well, she was. It was pink with streamers on the handlebars and it had one of those banana seats that you don’t see anymore. I think their disappearance is a mixed blessing. Mixed because they were just awkward and needed to go but, somewhere deep inside, I miss them, if only because they remind me of a simpler time. This story might also be why.

I’m walking home. I’ve just crossed Palm after lingering in Johnny’s for a bit, always wishing I had enough money for some candy. Now I’m walking down toward “D” street which is a straight shot toward home. Yolanda comes riding up out of nowhere.

I wish I could remember the exact conversation that we had but from what I can recall, I’m pretty sure it went something like this:

“Do you want a ride home?”

“Yeah, just sit on the back.”

And I did. She never sat down once while pedaling. She stood up the whole way (about two blocks) wearing those shiny shoes and that pink dress. We got to the front of my house. She let me off the bike and we had a quick goodbye and she was off again. Standing up while pedaling, around the corner, down “D” and out of sight.

I don’t know what happened to Yolanda after that. Much like some people do, she just fell off the face of the earth. Maybe she moved away. Maybe she quit school. Maybe she was doing time. Who knows?

I’m sure I understood then, but now, I can’t figure out why she would have given me a ride. Perhaps we were friends and I just don’t remember that part of our relationship. Maybe we were just in the same class and she recognized me. Maybe I was nice to her once and she wanted to be nice to me too. The reason, what ever it was, is now lost to time. But the kindness done to me that day has never left me and I don’t think it ever will. It was a simple and small thing that you did for me that day, but it still has an affect on me all these years later. A pebble in the pond.

Thank you for the ride Yolanda. I hope you are well, wherever you are.

Edge of Memory

After a much needed hiatus, the Lightning Round is back once again to give you bits of information that you could care less about and leave you disappointed and wanting the 2 to 3 minutes of your life back (please leave our wives out of this). As always, John is in blue and Jon is in red. On to the questions!

What’s your favorite card game?

I like poker (hold’em) but I’ve also been known to play Magic: The Gathering a few times as well (Nerd!). There’s a game we have now called Munchkin that is a lot of fun as well. Favorite? Hold’em.

I too would have to say Hold ‘Em, but there is also something to be said for a rousing game of Uno. Also, what was that card game we used to play at our first apartment in LA?

What’s your favorite roll-the-dice-and-move game?

I don’t know if I have one of those. For some reason “Monopoly” comes to mind but that game, to me, always seems like a good idea and then around hour 3, you’re willing to kill someone just to end the game. So, that being said, I’m going to go with “Sagred-opoly”.

Does Trivial Pursuit count? If so, I would have to say that is my favorite, followed by Life and Monopoly.

What’s your favorite playground game?

Back in the olden days (I’m talking when Mammoths still roamed freely) when I used to run and be active, I would have to say that kick-ball was my favorite. I remember a particular game during my fifth grade year. I was “pitching” and just as I was about to throw the ball, the bell rang and when the bell rang, we were supposed to freeze (the dumbest thing ever – but whatever). The girl I was pitching to kept saying “Pitch the ball. Pitch the ball! Pitch the damn ball!” because she wanted to have her last… at bat? at kick?… but I was too in fear of getting a dreaded “red card” to do so. This affected her so much that at the end of the year she wrote “Pitch the damn ball!” in my copy of our reasonable facsimile of a yearbook. It apparently also affected me so much that I chose to write about it 25 years… really? 25 years? Damn… later.

It is all about the Four Square.

What’s your favorite party game?

I’ve not been to enough parties to know of a single party game. I do however have fond memories of our Murder Mystery Dinner Parties. Those were fun. I have pictures around here somewhere…

I like the one where you have to put the name of a famous person in a hat and then you draw the names out and you have to act it out and see how many people can guess correctly in a short amount of time.

What’s your favorite computer game?

I thought this one would be hard but turns out, it’s not. Civilization. It’s the new crack.

Spider Solitaire and Free Cell

FQotD

I had dinner at Jason’s Deli last night — verdict: not too bad. I liked it enough to go back again. Plus, hey, free ice cream. — and as I reached into the fridge today to get the other quarter of my muffuletta (I was under the impression that it was a type of aquatic mammal but turns out, that’s not the case) I reflected on what the cashier told me about the sandwich.

“What do you mean? Are you telling me it’s not a mammal?”

“No, sir, it’s a sandwich. A rather large sandwich.”

It was at this point that my disbelief almost became my undoing. I tend to think that what some people consider huge is not actually huge to me. This most likely explains my current weight but, I digress. There was something in her eyes that told me that she might actually be serious.

“That’s why we have the half and the quarter size. Most people can’t finish it.”

I hesitated.

“I’ll take the half-size.”

What you see above is the other half of my monstrous sandwich. I took a couple of shots in an effort to try and show scale but I guess I’m just not that talented. I only seemed to highlight the fact that I have fat hands, pudgy fingers, and I could probably stand to cut my fingernails.

So take this as a warning. When you see a Muffuletta on the menu and the cute cashier girl tells you that it’s really big*, believe her.

*I’m not going for the cheap joke here. Even though that was, in fact, what she said.

Whatever