Wilde Childe

Back in junior high, there was an extremely attractive gal with a very tawdry reputation. (Doesn’t that sound like the beginning of a fantasy fable?) Lovely Linda was notoriously known for her flagrant bed-hopping and brazen thievery. We must have shared one class together as I recall overhearing many sordid tales of her wild exploits and narrow escapes. Sporting lavish face paint applied with her trusty trowel, she possessed pretty cornflower blue eyes, a substantial amount of bleached blonde hair, and a flawless, angelic face that belied the fact she was in reality, one wild teenage hellion. Two specific incidents come to mind as I nostalgically muse about days gone by. One was the widespread knowledge of her having posed for nudie pix and the extensive circulation of said photos throughout our hormonally-fueled campus. She was fully aware of them and quite proud of their existence and though I never saw the actual evidence, I assume they truly existed and were not a figment of overactive imaginations. Secondly, I remember her boastful bragging regarding her controversial skills at shoplifting. To this day I recall her telling an enthralled female audience about the time she swiped an entire ensemble right out from under the store’s oblivious nose (pre-clothes tagging) by wearing it under her outfit. Nowadays, her exploits would hardly raise an eyebrow but back then, she was considered quite the radical renegade. She dropped out of high school after an unplanned pregnancy overshadowed her educational endeavors and her further forays through life remain unknown. Though she made for a lot of gossip fodder at the time, I honestly hope she found that elusive happiness that seemed to have evaded her troubled youth.