Lillian Candelaria:  

Post-op boredom and reminiscing about childhood with Barbara (Nunez) Corey, my friend since 1st grade, has brought me here to Classmates.com for countless hours at a time in the past week. This is my story: I'd like to think that classmates from Marianna Ave Elem remember me as starting off quiet and studious, later to become friendly and fun to be around. I do hope kids forgot that I cried a lot in first and second grade. I remember close friends (a couple of whom have remained my closest friends nearly 40 years later) as loyal, smart, sweet and slightly mischievious in a playful way. My girlfriends were all sweet and fun to be around. My favorite memories with those friends are of countless hours playing on the monkey bars. I remember many of the young boys as decent and kind. All in all, It was a pleasurable experience because so much was learned and I was lucky to have had great teachers to guide and encourage me. I always wanted to be a wife and mother, as well as writer when I grew up. My family and friends had no clue about my hopes and dreams. As it turns out they were in for a pleasant surprise. One of my ambitions from age seven was to make it out of East Los Angeles, which wasn't as hard to do as I thought. I went on to live in California's Coachella Valley, then did some "growing up" in Tustin, Santa Ana and Irvine, CA. After that, life began to stablize when I returned to the Coachella Valley where my mom still lives. Years later I did get married and started a family. I've been m...Expand for more