SCORE!

I was a hick from a small town in Ontario.  My parents moved us to the "big" city when I was thirteen. I met Donya very soon after moving.  She was my best friend and I love her to this day.  Like most youngsters, we laughed a lot....the kind of side-splitting, choking, breathless, crying, nose-running laughter that so typifies the 'teen' years.  


Donya, ever the joker, taught me many games.  She would stop dead in her tracks in the middle of a busy, downtown sidewalk, gaze at the sky and point, a look of amazement on her face.  Inevitably, other pedestrians would stop and look up, searching the sky for whatever it was that had captured her attention.  Garbage cans were the focus of another one of her games...she would stop, look inside a can and gasp.  Drawn by her obvious bewilderment, curious folk would gather round the receptacle.  However, I'm quite sure that her preferred pastime was embarrassing her friend, the country bumpkin (aka me). Elevators were the favourite venue for her sadistic tricks...I was at her mercy, not able to escape her comments.  The doors would slide open, the elevator would be full of unsuspecting people, but I knew what to expect.  My heart would start racing as soon as  we entered and the doors closed.  She would start.  "Did you tell your parents about the pregnancy test?  Do they know yet?  What will you do with the baby?"  Or..."Next time you should buy condoms."  My face would turn beet-red and not knowing how to retort, I would burst helplessly into giggles. She, however, would remain stony-faced.  "Why are you laughing?  It's not funny to be so young and pregnant!  You have to tell them."  It was almost too much for my fifteen-year-old self to handle and when the elevators doors opened again, I would fly out, mortified!


Donya loved to play 'Score'.  "It's so cold in here," she would aver (in an uncomfortably warm room).  "No, it isn't....how can you say that?  I'm sweating," the innocent victim would reply.  "SCORE!"  Her index finger would trace one point in the air. Or, she would point to a very slight girl..."Look at that fat girl over there in the blue jacket!  She should lose some weight!"  The prey would retort, "She's not fat; she's so thin.  What are you talking about?"  "SCORE!"  She would chalk up another point.


I had two groups of friends at that time.  One group included Donya.  The other group included Chack. The two groups didn't know each other and therefore Chack didn't know Donya.  I shared my knowledge of the game of Score with Chack's group and we were off and running, scoring each other to our hearts' content.


Years passed and Donya moved to L.A.  Chack moved to Vancouver.  One day, Chack from Vancouver, happened to be in Toronto and was having dinner in a restaurant. A waiter approached the table behind hers and said, "Would you care for something to drink?"  She heard a woman say, "I'll have a daiquiri (daiQUIri ) please."  "I think you mean a daiquiri (DAIquiri)." he gently suggested.  Chack heard a triumphant, "SCORE!!" She turned in her chair and said to the woman, "Excuse me, but do you by any chance know Arlene G......?"  "Well, of course I do." retorted my friend Donya from California.