Posing by the portrait I painted of him when we were thirteen years old is my friend Ed Hanahan. We met when we were six years old, when the Mackey clan moved into the house across the street from the Hanahans. The bond between us was instantaneous, and after fifty-two years, shows no sign of weakening. Ed has traveled and lived all over the world, and when he retired from American Airlines after thirty years, and moved back to Valdosta last year, his sister Eve (Renfro) and I were ecstatic. It's been wonderful having him home again.

This is Ed again, standing by the portrait I did of him in the early seventies, when we were in college. I called this his John Denver look.

When we were in grammar school, we were always coming up with schemes to make money to supplement our meager allowances. There was always the obligatory lemonade stand, but we sold Kool-Ade , because it was cheaper and easier to make.

We had a neighborhood newspaper, but we didn't sell too many issues, because pre-Xerox, we had to write every copy by hand. Daddy always bought one, and Mama saved them in a scrapbook, so I still have them. The newspaper was called The Teeny Tiny Times by the Itty Bitty Writers; Ed was the editor and I was the roving reporter.

One of our more innovative plots evolved after we found a pile of old bricks behind the Brights' garage. We dug a hole in the Hanahans front yard, and built a wall around it , calling it a wishing well. Then we sold wishes, one for a nickel, three for a dime.

If only life was still this simple.