#71, Alexandria.

Ah, Alexandria. My childhood partner-in-crime. You were so pretty and mischievous, with long, wavy, dark golden hair. i remember playing Atari (Donkey Kong!) and eating deliciously sweet lemon-flavored yogurt (through a straw) at your house, which was one of the nicer ones i'd ever seen. It had rosebushes and a white-picket fence, not to mention a secret door in one of the upstairs hallways that lead to the attic. Super exciting. You and i were obsessed with Richie Valens for awhile; we'd sit on the light-blue carpet of your bedroom floor belting out "Oh Donna" and "Boney Maronie". We knew all of the lyrics to every song, and we must have watched La Bamba like eighty times. i used to steal tubs of Betty Crocker chocolate frosting and eat it at your house. i kept it hidden underneath your bed, along with a spoon. You had rose-scented Play-Doh, a Corgi who was constantly trying to hump my leg, and a cute older brother whom i had a crush on. Once, in your backyard, he flicked my leg with a wet towel and it left a huge welt.

One afternoon, we decided to pull off The Great Candy Heist. Dressed up in various costumey-accessories (a flashy gold lamé purse among them), we headed to the nearby drug store. Once in the candy aisle, i stuffed bar after bar of the good stuff into my purse, and into the giant rolled-up cuffs of my pants. You had your shirt bottom pulled up and then back down through the neck hole, bra-style, and were busily shoving bags of M&Ms in there. i believe there were also some Abba Zabbas crammed into your cowboy boots. i had Butterfingers in my jacket sleeves. We bought a Caramello each, for authenticity, and headed toward the sliding doors with our score.

An old security guard caught us (Your mother let you buy that much candy?) before we even got to the parking lot. We were marched back down the candy aisle (i sobbed: we'll put it baaaaack!) to the office at the rear of the store. Mug shots were taken of us both, each with a mat placed on our knees containing the heap of candy we'd stolen. Our parents were phoned, and arrived shortly to drag us to the car by our wrists. We were forbidden to see each other after that, and (i don't know about you but) i was grounded for weeks. We lost touch sometime after that. You went to Costa Rica? That's all i knew. Hope to get back in touch with you some day.

#70, Troy.

Troy was a very small man with sad eyes and a troubled affect, who used to come into the bakery when i first started there. He would always show up around 6:00 for a cup of coffee and offer up some (extremely quiet and hard to understand) small talk. Eventually i realized he was hitting on me, in a very roundabout way, and had to sort of... let him down, gently. He seemed very sensitive, and eventually it came out that out he was a jockey at Golden Gate Fields. One day he just stopped coming in. Today i watched a video of this year's Kentucky Derby final (wow!), and remembered Troy. Hope you're happy out there, buddy.