The 1993 movie "The Sandlot" sure brings back many pleasant memories about growing up in a small town. The story takes place in the summer of 1962. A new boy in town joins the neighborhood baseball team and tries desperately to fit in with others. It's a script that would fly in every small town, which is why you fall in love with the film. I could relate in more ways than one to the character Michael "Squints" Palledorous played by Chauncey Leopardi. They called him "Squints" because he wore glasses and was always squinting to see. Been there; done that.

The only difference was my moniker was "four eyes" among others. I actually looked like the guy on Mad Magazine, Alfred E. Newman. We both were missing a front tooth, but I was just as ugly and I wore glasses. A double kiss of death. Throw in a couple of big ears, a Catholic heritage and a guy who had a Mediterranean descent and, well, there's so much here to pick on… why stop with glasses?

"Squints" staged his own fake drowning in the movie so that he could be saved by the female lifeguard, a tall drink of water who was older and more developed than "Squints." Like the older girls of my day, we fantasized about these babes in our town. One of our "babes" was Angela Clark. I guess it's nice to have dreams about the "Angela's" of the world, but my favorite fantasy was about my aunt, Judy Mack.

No, she wasn't my real aunt. She was my mother's adopted half sister and she was only a couple of years older than I was. Judy came from a broken home and my grandfather, Eli Mack and his second wife, Tina adopted Judy when I was a child. So I wasn't blood related. My luck; I fall in love with my step-aunt. Oh well, such is life.

Judy was so beautiful. She went on to become an airline attendant for American Airlines before dying tragically at a very young age of cancer. She was such a special person. She always made me and every other stargazing boy in Lexington, SC feel special.

The last time I actually saw Judy was right before she became deathly ill. I was giving a speech in Dallas and she was based there at the time. I stayed over to visit her for a few days. She had recently divorced her airline pilot husband with whom she had a young son. She died shortly after that.

Every new kid in every community can identify with the Judy's of the world. She comes into a new town where no one knows her and she has to find a way to fit in. Movies like "Karate Kid" are based on the whole premise.

Ralph Macchio took his New Jersey background to California in the movie and got the same kind of mixed welcome. Members of the opposite sex fell in love with them; they weren't as welcomed by the others.

But Aunt Judy never had a problem that I could see. People instantly liked her despite the damaged background that preceded her adoption by my grandparents. She got involved immediately in the school in everything from beauty contests to becoming a cheerleader. This is stuff people do in small towns.

I remember she competed in a beauty contest one year and one obnoxious female on-looker challenged what she was wearing under her swimsuit. Judy pulled the lady aside and gave her a quick glance to prove that the items in question were, in fact, real. She proceeded to show her another part of her anatomy and offered the lady to kiss it to see if it too was real. Small town jealousies are like that.

I miss Judy's sweet smile and tender demeanor. She was an unsung "shero" in my life because she overcame tremendous odds to make something of her time here on earth. A lot could have gone wrong with my grandparents adopting a damaged teenager. But they loved her as much as they did their own children and helped Judy to make something special of her abbreviated existence. It's too bad it ended so unfortunately at such a young age.