A Girl Named Cam.....

People always ask me "why did I move to Kentucky?" Of all places??? An Iowa girl who was so naive and protected, an Iowa girl who was so rebellious and independent, an Iowa girl who had NO family in Kentucky and always thought people in Kentucky lived a simple life of bootlegging and bare footing... Like I said "naive". So why you ask? Well aside from the fact that I needed a break from reality that I knew as Iowa, the true reason I moved to Kentucky is because of a girl named Cameron, or Cam as I call her. Get your drink of tea and popcorn and sit back because this story is a good one.......

It was the summer of 98, my husband had just left me and my son with our new house and no way to afford it. And when I mean left, I mean left... with no notice, no phone call, no warning of any problems, just left. I already lived far away from family, six hours away, and the closest relative I called family was an ex boyfriends mom who had taken me under her wing and helped me become the independent person I am today. I was the part time worker and full time mom in our home, and now stuck with all the bills and responsibilities of holding a half family together. My husband was the drunk, whose mother lived half a mile away from the town we lived in where everybody knew everybody and was in everybody's business. It was a place I would later tell my friends "a town where you came to die". For example: The Gundersons lived on our street, their parents lived two streets over, their grandparents lived down the first gravel road out of town next to their parents The Gundersons. This was no place for a girl like me from a big city of Cedar Rapids, Iowa where your family is spread out all over town to be. In our small town, I was the outsider who had drove my husband away. I was the one they whispered about in the one tiny store/gas station they had. I was the shunned one who had little for friends or a support system.

The friends I did have became my family. In every sense of the word. I gained a best friend in Millie, a mother in Shirley, brothers in Paco, Michael, Daryl and Jason and good friends like Robert and Dlisha and Molly, Som and his brother C. This, in short, was our circle. Our click. We were not a bad click. We did not do bad things. In our small town, there was nothing to do and I mean NOTHING! We would all get together at my house on Monday nights to watch wrestling. The guys all did bike tricks in my basement, we even built a ramp down there. On Saturday afternoons, Paco and C would watch Lifetime movies with me (although they probably wouldn't admit to it) and I would make us all hot dogs in crescent rolls or "pigs in a blanket" as you would say in Iowa. We played darts in my basement and drank beer and even smoked occasionally but this was what we did to forget about our pains. We never stole, mistreated or vandalised anything (except we did graffiti on my basement wall), but we were a good group of kids and with what I had just been though, they were it for me.

To tell you the story of Cam, I first need to tell you the short story of Jason.... an only child to Shirley, spoiled, crazy, reckless, wild child who always tried to be younger than he was. A hit with the ladies, they always wanted Jason, and he never knew how to say "no". This made it hard for any of his girlfriends. I say girlfriends because, he had many. I met Jason in my home town and he was one of those "bad boys" you always think you can fix, but little did I know there was no fixing him. I left my big city and moved to his small town to do just that, but a jail and prison sentence later, I knew we were better off friends... and a "brother" he then became. After his four day failed marriage to MaryAnn, (who I couldn't stand) he decided to stay with friends in Nashville for awhile, and this is where he met Cam. He was crazy about Cam, and I was excited he was with anyone other than MaryAnn.

Cam was obviously just as crazy about him, because she couldn't stand the fact that he had moved back to our small town in Iowa, and she decided to spread her wings and move too. To IOWA! The first time I met her.....I knew we would be friends. She was this cute little southern girl, with a cute little southern accent, and tons of ambition. Not the southern belles you see on TV with there umbrellas and big dresses, but a southern belle nonetheless. She had shoulder length brown all curly hair and the biggest brown eyes and the biggest smile to match. The one thing I knew from Jason about Cam, was that she was all about family and loved kids. Her and my son, Austin, seemed to bond on site. And she was a perfect addition to our "family click" indeed. We were like two bookends, Cam and I. We fought for the main character of our crazy life, and supported each other as well as the best supporting actress would. We laughed together, played together, even worked together on occasion and although the plan was for her and Jason to move into his mom's house, it wasn't long before she had moved into mine. She cracked me up with a thing called sweet tea. I had never heard of that. We had SUN tea, made in a big pitcher with tea bags and the good ol' sun. She had sweet tea, boiled on the stove with lots of sugar. She didn't carry things, she packed them, She had a whole family back home in Kentucky of "and dems" Mama and who? She had a Granddaddy who was the grandest of them all, literally. I had always had a Grandma and Grandpa and had never heard or met a granddaddy until I met Cam's. She was nutty like me and always had something silly to say with my something crazy! She helped me with my son and with my house and I was grateful she was in my life.

As with all Jason's girlfriends, time was running up for he and Cam and I dreaded this for she and I had bonded. Cameron had taken Jason, Daryl, my son and I with her for Labor Day weekend to Kentucky. She showed us the sights of Nashville, Tennessee and introduced us to her little sisters, Ash and Katherine and family. Her mother was a gracious host allowing all of us to crash at their home, and her father was also a good guy. You could tell they cared a lot about Cameron and her well being, and I assured them no matter what, with me, Cam was safe. Little did I know Cameron was already arranging to move back home. Jason was breaking her heart and she had suffered enough. The lies, the manipulation, the heartbreak and pain, you really don't want to hear the bad stuff... When she moved away she just had to get out. She had seen the man for who he was and there was no way she could raise their child with him. Not around him, she needed her family....

A few months passed, the dust settled, and I wrote to Cam and asked her if she was okay. Could we patch things up? To me our friendship was bigger than her relationship, and to her the relationship had caused her to become pregnant and now a baby was her future. At first she wondered if she had done the right thing by moving back home, but when she had seen he had already moved on, she knew she had made the right decision. It was at this moment that our friendship was no longer about "them" or "him" but about "us". Me and Cam. Friends... soul sisters as she would say....

Her pregnancy was not easy. She was referred to specialist, who inturn said the baby wasn't growing right, she was ordered to bed rest. The Cam that drove states away, that ran with my son in the parks and drove aimlessly on the country roads with me in Iowa, was bedridden. This was killing her but she was willed to do anything for this baby growing inside her. It was her one last connection to "him", and now instead of love she had spite to do something good. To raise a child of his not to become the loser that his Dad was to her. She was having a boy, and this really got to Jason. He wanted her to come back, but by now she was determined, like I was before her, to be independent, and Iowa was the last thing on her mind. I talked to her by phone on a daily basis. I was trying to sell my house and move away from this small town that haunted me and to get as far away as possible. When she called me in tears in a panic on that hot summer day in June, I will never forget the scared little girl on the other end of that phone.......

Her baby was born and rushed to Vanderbilt Medical Center. He had heart problems and they were unsure if he would make it. I needed to be there for my friend and she needed me. I had already had my house on the market and my mind was made up. Whatever the outcome of this I was moving to Kentucky... to be with Cam and her baby boy, Dylan Hill Thomas ( named after her granddaddy).

Our wish came true and on October 1st 1999 Austin and I said goodbye to one family and headed to Kentucky to be with another. Cameron and Dylan, who was now 3 months old, were waiting for us in our new apartment and we quickly settled in. Kentucky was different in a lot of ways than Iowa. In Iowa if you have a problem with your neighbor you just quit talking to them, in Kentucky you confront them, call them out, and let them know they better not come back, sometimes with a frying pan depending on how serious you were. My best friend Millie joined us in Kentucky a month later but eventually ventured onto bigger and better cities and jobs in Atlanta. Cameron and I lived together for awhile but she quickly found a place for her and her new boyfriend, and left Austin and I in the apartment to settle into Kentucky.

As the years went by and I continued to meet new people and experience new things in Kentucky, we slowly drifted apart. Though never to still be more than a phone call away, our closeness and frequent visits became less and less. Cameron found a husband and father in Bergen and the two were married in a beautiful ceremony that I could not attend due to my pregnancy, and again it was a day I knew she needed me, and I needed her. When my daughter was born, Cameron was the first to say, "let me help" and her and Dylan became babysitters at times when I worked and had no one to watch her. We always had an unspoken word between us... a bond that said "no matter what, I'm there for you". When her granddaddy fell ill Cameron packed up her son and husband and moved them to her grandparent's home to help take care of him. The southern girl I had met in Iowa was once again taking care of her family. It was at this time we lost touch......

I had gotten busy and overwhelmed with taking care of two children as a single mom and I knew she couldn't handle my burdens as well as her own. She was becoming the backbone of her family and with both grandparents passing she did just that. She rose above it all and found strength to tend to them when they were ill and at their lowest. From her granddaddy to her grandma, to her mother and sisters, Cameron was the glue holding her family together.

Little did I know, she was also going through pain herself.....

Years went by and I wondered what Cameron was doing and how her and that beautiful baby Dylan were. I wondered if they were even still in Kentucky, if her Mom still lived in the same place. I had not seen her around. Even though I had moved to this state for her and her son, to help them, mentally, financially, and physically, I had let her slip away, and wasn't sure how I would find her again. I had moved all this way, only to lose track of her..... Mission Not Accomplished.

The happy ending my friends is that I recently found my Cam. She is living the good life in a little town of Blackshear, Georgia where the main mode of transportation is the golf cart. She is still married to that wonderful Bergman who wakes up everyday and lives to make her happy. Her son Dylan is a smart, strong little man who is growing up with a great father and incredible surroundings. Cameron is well. Cameron has lived and loved and Cameron has even lost but in the end Cameron has become someone to admire. The way she makes it look so easy... life that is... the accomplishments and obstacles she has overcome. She is someone I am proud, so proud to call a friend. A true friend. A loving mother to her children, a great sister to Ash and Kat, an incredible daughter to Bonita, and an all around genuine soul sister to me. I am in awe of her and her abilities. I thought I was the strong one yet she is stronger, I thought I had the courage and stability, yet once again it is her. If you ever meet her make sure you take it all in..... because she is the true meaning of southern hospitality and a true soldier in the name of sisterhood.
I love ya Cam!