Remembering long lost friends

I don’t remember when they first appeared in my life, but I suspect they were about four years old. My memories before kindergarten are few. The family living room was the first room she entered upon entering through the front door. We lived in a two-family house on the first floor, with my grandparents on the second floor. In fact, they owned the house that was located on a busy avenue in a small town in New Jersey.

My imaginary friends lived on the wall behind the front door. I would hit the wall and press my face against it trying to look through the painted sheet of rock to glimpse her world. I think I created Cooney, Chetty and Susan because I wanted someone to play with. I was so ahead of my time creating a virtual playdate.

Usually when asked if they wanted to play, Susan was most of the time the only one who could, because Chetty and Susan always went to Florida and left Susan at home. I felt bad for her. We danced for hours in the living room, doing fabulous stunts from the cushion staring at each other in the mirrored wall my parents had installed at the time. That was the ’70s style. We had a whole wall of mirror tile with a layer of crisp film. So modern! Oh, don’t you dare leave your fingerprints on them, as you would hear my mother’s anger. It was one of the many things that bothered her.

I remember running to the half wall between the dining room and the kitchen while my father and mother sat finishing dinner, telling them stories about my friends and just sitting there chewing and nodding like this was normal and okay. they. I was fucking crazy and they let me go with it. To be honest, I always had the feeling that they thought I was a bit out of place.

I don’t remember when my friends disappeared and we stopped playing together, but I still have to doubt their existence. I wonder why I gave them these crazy names. I mean Susan is mainstream, but Cooney and Chetty? Their names are as familiar to me as the friends I had in elementary school. I don’t remember his appearance. That will remain a mystery forever.

Experts would say that children develop imaginary friends to help them deal with changes or moments of transition. Perhaps unconsciously I knew that my life would change soon, a kind of sixth sense, because until that moment I think we were happy as a family. Again, my memories at this age and younger are scant. All I know is that my imaginary friends comforted me, like a blanket or a stuffed animal.