"Me and Bogie McGhee"

Me and Bogie have been pals since we were youngsters of 4 and 5 respectively. He being the older of us by 11 months. We were next door neighbors back in the days of the late 50's. We were unaware of the cold war and Eisenhower and the McCarthy era. We were just kids trying to have fun in a crazy world.

Sometimes Bogie's mom would invite me over for dinner. I thought she made the best hamburgers. She told me her secret ingredient-bread crumbs. I then told my mom:

"Mrs. McGhee makes some really good burgers, Mom."

"Oh, she does. Well, why don't you go live with her?"

"Huh?"

I decided then and there to keep that kind of stuff bottled up in me. Don't hurt your mom's feelings by telling her someone else is a better cook. Even if it was only burgers.

But Bogie and me were pals even though we would always get into fights. I was bigger than him and could whip his butt mano a mano, but Bob was a better rock thrower. He knew how to grab the stone with his forefinger which made for accuracy and power. I don't recall any aero-dynamic books lying around the older red brick manor he called home, but he had rock throwing down to a science. I don't remember what we argued about. Just kid things, I guess. We were always trying to outdo each other and trying to get a one-upmanship on the other.

"When I was born, my mom said I cost a million dollars," Bogie once told me.

I stopped for a minute in my tracks.

"You didn't cost a million dollars." I said, knowing that was a lot of money, but, secretly, I couldn't be sure if his tale were true.

We would fight about anything. Once I was running away from Bogie after another skirmish and thought I was safe on the iron railing stairs that reached up to our garage apartment. Bogie had to be 50 feet away. He bent over straightened up and "zing." The bullet was headed straight for me. I tried to turn and duck, do anything to get out of the way, when that sucker hit me square in the left arm.

A big bruise popped up immediately. Damn it hurt. I uttered a few choice kiddie expletives and somehow found my way to the top of the stairs, inside the screen porch and through our front door. Battered and defeated, I drug myself into the bath. We had no shower, and I doubt if I even knew of such. Crying while looking and touching the big welt on my arm, I didn't even feel like playing with my toy soldiers which were perched around the corners of the tub. Soon a letter arrived from Bogie via his sister, Ilsa. It read:

"I'm sorry I hit you with that rock. I love you, Bogie!"

That's all it took. Yeah, we were buddies again.

Bogie had moved into the neighborhood like I said when he was 5 and I was 4. I would see him in his backyard and he would see me in the front yard. We studied each other but were too afraid to start up a conversation. I'm sure we both secretly hoped that we would have a budding relationship. An L.B. lived next door to me, too, and he was a tough young juvenile delinquent, who once cut my big toe when he threw a sliver of glass in my direction. But this new kid looked my age and didn't appear to sport a ducktail or wear a leather jacket.

My mom had been telling me that I would soon have to start school and it was called kindergarten. My older sister went to school, so I was somewhat aware of the routine. She said I would meet new people and have a grand old time. Me, I wasn't so sure about this school thing, because I was having a blast doing nothing but having fun.

The big day arrived and me and my mom made the walk to school. We met Miss Dale, the kindergarten teacher, and her dog, Davy Crockett, and we also met a young, reddish- brown haired kid named Bogie and his mom.

As we left the school and were walking back home, his mom and mine talked while me and Bogie skipped and ran and did crazy kid things. We would become best pals for life.