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TF: And when I got to Florida, it was as if night and day for me from Chicago and the way people treated me. 'Cause on my senior prom, when this young boy had invited me and then his parents made him uninvite me, I just felt like there was always, you were so aware of race at the time. And then I got down there, and people were so warm and friendly, my classmates. This girl who became the queen of the college, and from the time I first met her, she's blond, blue-eyed, and she had a convertible. My mother just bought some fabric at some store, made me a few dresses so I'd have a few outfits, but they're all homemade. My roommate would fly -- they'd go to Paris and New York and she had all these fancy De Pinna dresses or shoes that had names that I never heard of, but they were all the brand, big brand names. My roommate was wonderful. She was a southern girl, and everything was "sugar, honey, darling, sweetheart," and hugging and kissing your mother. Well, I had never... I told you about the hugging and kissing, I hadn't had any of that, and I never saw my mother and father touch, or they never held me. And her mother would be over all the time, and it'd be nothing but endearments and all this hugging. And I went home after the first year -- I couldn't go home during the holidays sometimes because it's too expensive -- but when I went home, I worked in the summer at the same company, they hired me back. And I thought, "When I leave to go back to college," I girded my loins, and as they took me to the, did I take the train the second time? I think I did. I decided I'm going to give 'em a hug. It nearly killed all of us. You know how people get really stiff when you're trying? So it was that, and very uncomfortable, but I did it. And from then on, whenever I would see them or leave them. I didn't do it when I got home, but I thought about it all summer long. And I thought, I'm gonna give 'em a hug when I leave them. So she taught me how to physically and verbally show affection. I had never really seen it, and I am affectionate. I think I got a lot of that from watching her, and I liked it.

And another girl -- that was my friend Ginger who was my roommate -- the other one, Doane, who just never seemed to notice that I was different. She would just take me places, and it was just like having a friend, and I never really had a friend like that. So they taught me more about friendship. And then this other girl who I had no idea that she was so wealthy, they were all so wealthy. And here I am with dresses that my mother had sewed, and just little inexpensive... they never seemed to notice, and it didn't seem to make any difference to them. And the fact that I was Japanese, it's like they didn't notice or comment, or I didn't feel it. You can feel it even if it's nothing else. I didn't feel that. And when she was going home for the summer and I knew I had to work, but she insisted, "You must come, I'm going to make my debut." Well, whoever heard of a debut? I didn't know anybody who was making a debut, but she was, it's in Washington, D.C. So I was her guest for a week. She said -- because I don't have pretty dresses -- she said, "Don't worry." She had a closet full of gowns. Every night we'd go in and I just, we were about the same size, I could pick out any gown I wanted. And she had a maid that in the old days would be called like a black Mamie, just nice and big and warm and heavyset. And we'd be eating breakfast at two or three in the afternoon, and then the whole night was set for, it was a whole different kind of life that I'd never experienced or knew about. And she just made it seem like, oh, that's something, and she just wanted to share it with me. And so you're going out with the West Point cadets or whatever, and every night it's a party because it was her whole week of coming out. They introduced me to a whole wonderful kind of life, but what I remember most of all is the fact that I didn't feel different. I felt like we were just friends or pals.

And so years later, 'cause you don't always stay in touch, I wrote to two of the girls to tell them the memories that I had of them. And maybe I didn't know it at the time, but how much I appreciated it, you know, looking back. And I wished I could have found the address to them, but, you know, I think she was married and divorced, married and divorced. And so girls change their name, and I wasn't able to be in touch with her. But I think about her often and I hope she was happy. Some of the girls have now died. But that was like a magical time in my life.

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.