Writing 101 – Serially Lost – Part 1

Maureen and Darlene are lost to me. Perhaps someday they will be found but not today, that is almost certain. They were lost at the same time but were not together when they were lost. It is possible they are together even now. They may be alive, but they may not be, I don’t seem to be able to find out their fate.

I left them. I went back to the place where I left them recently but they were not there. I actually did not expect to find them there but I hoped I might.   Perhaps putting this in writing for the first time will help. I would like to find them but I am a bit afraid of what I might actually discover if I find them. I might learn more about myself than I want to know if I were to find them.

Both of them had (have? I do not know) very dark hair. Maureen had (has) piercing blue eyes, Darlene’s are/were dark brown. Maureen has/had few charming freckles across the bridge of her nose and onto her cheeks. Both were then but may not be now, my height, I am 5’8”. Darlene is more indistinct in my memory; I spent more time with Maureen and her younger sister Karen. Actually we all avoided Karen, she was annoying.

I cried when I lost them. I cried off and on for days afterward. There was no suitable replacement or substitute for them. It took a long time to find someone who even came close, it was a painful loss; I don’t think I ever really recovered. There was someone else who finally came along, she filled the void but differently, and it was not possible to be the same. I lost her for a time too; but now I know where she is; she actually found me. I will tell her story in Part 2…

Maureen and Darlene, childhood friends, lost when I moved away to a new neighborhood long ago, a part of my childhood lost with them.