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him lying in my bed my face covered with hot tears. My father bought me another dog in the begining of the summer. Is it a boy like Topsy, I remember saying over the phone to my father. No it's a girl Michael. Her hair was shiny black, and she was very fast so I named her Flash. She was a Cocker Spanual and very shy, but when she would run she was exciting and filled with life with her long ears flaping back in the wind. Flash lived quietly and almost unnoticed in our home for sixteen years before she died, and the only thing I remember about her was her runing to us though Metzes field to her home and her quietness. Through that summer it became easier and easier for me to talk my Mother into leting me leave our yard and go across the street to wander in Metzes field. The first real friend I ever made was named Danial Learry. We would be going together to kindergarden at Lincoln school in the fall and his mother and father came from very wealthy and traditional Protestant families that I found out later were orange people, because they were Irish and not Catholics. I met him one day when I wandered up to the street behind our yard where he lived in a house that really looked like a castle with high red brick walls and winding stairs that led under an iron arch with an old lighter lamp hanging from the top. There were lots of boys and girls playing softball, but he was just standing by his wall watching and he looked like he was waiting for something. He was very thin and unaware of his body, because he was quiet when he was alone. He was dreaming about other things besides softball, although I bet he was a very good player. He didn't seem to care whether he played or not but I did and I went up to the boys