The year my best friend moved away, I was forced to make some new ones to fill the void. Riding the bus home from school one day, I found one. Duane and I didn’t have a whole lot in common, but when you’re in third grade, you don’t need to. We both had bicycles and liked playing in the creek. When you’re eight years old, sometimes that’s enough to base a friendship on.

It’s been so long that I don’t remember much about Duane. He grew up in Mississippi, and had the accent to prove it. His toys were low-tech compared to mine. In 1983, my days were filled with video and computer games. At Duane’s, we played with green army men and Playmobil figures. To be honest I don’t remember spending too much time in his house, or him in mine. Mostly, we just spent the summer riding our bikes and playing in the creek.

One day I rode my bike over to Duane’s house and discovered he had moved away.

I haven’t thought about Duane in more than thirty years. A couple of weekends ago, I went to a garage sale at his old house. The driveway leading up to the house is unique, and looks just how it did back in 1983 when the two of us set up a ramp and jumped our bikes off of it into the ditch below.

Years ago, that would have been the end of the story. Today, I found Duane online (thanks to a fairly unique last name) in about two minutes. Based on his Facebook profile, he was in the military, and now lives in Texas. I didn’t send him a note or anything (what would I say?) but it was nice to see that Duane is doing okay. If he ever comes back to Oklahoma, we can go ride bikes together again.

They paved the creek.