Leni was one of my best friends in high school. There were three of us. Me, Shirley, and Leni. We'd all met in junior high and became inseparable. We rotated houses on weekends for sleepovers and ran in our neighborhood's "gangs" of friends. There weren't any girls in Leni's neighborhood, except for Leni, so Shirley and I were her backup. It was great.
Then high school hit. and boys. and studying. and boys. and driving. and boys. All of a sudden we were still hanging out together, but there were boys involved. AP classes kept all of us busy. Leni was the first of us who got a "real job" (aka not babysitting) and the first of us who had a "real boyfriend" (aka not a high school boy.)
Leni was engaged to her boyfriend in her senior year. I remember the day she showed me her ring. She was exquisitely happy.
Soon after we graduated, while driving home from work for lunch, on a sunny San Diego afternoon, she crested a hill and was hit head-on by a man who had been driving in the wrong lane for over a mile and who was drunk. To this day, I don't know if anything happened to him physically or legally.
At Leni's funeral, many of those kids I'd grown up with, who were a little older than us and who I hadn't seen since graduation, were there. They were our "guy friends" from Leni's neighborhood. She was going to be buried in Riverside county so many of us carpooled. While I sat in the back, about halfway there, the group I was with started passing around a bottle of booze to everyone, including the driver. I asked them to stop and was bullied into silence.
When we got to the cemetary, I got out, cried my eyes out while she was buried, and rode home with Shirley. I never spoke to those friends again.
Leni's death was tragic and devastating to me and Shirley, but Shirl and I are still good friends today and are involved in each others lives and families. Once a year, every year, since Leni died, we remember her by doing Leni's favorite thing: Going out for "bouncing pizza" and drinking so much soda that we get sugar silly and laugh until our sides hurt.
Christina Hawkins (Hicks)
Leni was one of my best friends in high school. There were three of us. Me, Shirley, and Leni. We'd all met in junior high and became inseparable. We rotated houses on weekends for sleepovers and ran in our neighborhood's "gangs" of friends. There weren't any girls in Leni's neighborhood, except for Leni, so Shirley and I were her backup. It was great.
Then high school hit. and boys. and studying. and boys. and driving. and boys. All of a sudden we were still hanging out together, but there were boys involved. AP classes kept all of us busy. Leni was the first of us who got a "real job" (aka not babysitting) and the first of us who had a "real boyfriend" (aka not a high school boy.)
Leni was engaged to her boyfriend in her senior year. I remember the day she showed me her ring. She was exquisitely happy.
Soon after we graduated, while driving home from work for lunch, on a sunny San Diego afternoon, she crested a hill and was hit head-on by a man who had been driving in the wrong lane for over a mile and who was drunk. To this day, I don't know if anything happened to him physically or legally.
At Leni's funeral, many of those kids I'd grown up with, who were a little older than us and who I hadn't seen since graduation, were there. They were our "guy friends" from Leni's neighborhood. She was going to be buried in Riverside county so many of us carpooled. While I sat in the back, about halfway there, the group I was with started passing around a bottle of booze to everyone, including the driver. I asked them to stop and was bullied into silence.
When we got to the cemetary, I got out, cried my eyes out while she was buried, and rode home with Shirley. I never spoke to those friends again.
Leni's death was tragic and devastating to me and Shirley, but Shirl and I are still good friends today and are involved in each others lives and families. Once a year, every year, since Leni died, we remember her by doing Leni's favorite thing: Going out for "bouncing pizza" and drinking so much soda that we get sugar silly and laugh until our sides hurt.
We love and miss you very much, Leni.