Carol L. Iwasaki was one of the nicest people to ever live. From the moment I met her in 1975, I always felt love and respect for her. We were both about 16 years old, and in our first year at University High School, in West Los Angeles. She was a very beautiful, soft spoken, polite lady. She conducted herself with dignity at all times. She always greeted me and others with genuine warmth and affection. She was a kind person and she was a nice person. She loved to drive her Datsun 240z to social events she attended all through high school. She later, probably due to her parent's intervention, started driving a larger, slower "Seville", maybe a 1976 model year. She loved going to concerts, and was a very "bubbly" and "happy" seeming" person. Her good friend "Terri" and her were a real team together, both very pretty and very nice to spend time with. Carol was always very supportive as a friend, and very giving of her time in support of her friends. she would follow through. She would be the one who would find a friend to bring, and they would be the ones to attend your art show , film screening , musical event, or whatever event for which you needed her attendance and moral support. She was a real friend, that would actually deliver. Carol was someone who was very sensitive to the needs and feelings of others.
I once or twice drove to her family home in lower Bel-Air, possibly on Bel-Air road or maybe another nearby lane. Carol was from a fine family, and I remember that she had a little sister that looked very much like her. A few of her friends that I remember were Miss Terri Freeman and
Miss Vanessa Feldman ?. I also remember that I believe she attended Pierce College, somewhere in the west San Fernando Valley.
I stayed in touch with her and spoke to her often after High School, We remained friends. One day in 1993 or early 1994, I spoke to her from my home in Santa Barbara, where I still reside. shortly afterward she stopped returning my telephone calls,
I thought that I must have said something she did not like, So I left her a message at "(213) 476-2544" (her line at her parent's home) explaining that I wish for her to call me and allow me to apologize if I had in someway hurt her feelings. A day or two later she called me and explained that I had done absolutely nothing wrong, and that she was still my friend, but she said she had been to U.C.L.A. hospital, and was having some difficulties.
A few weeks later she called me from France, where she explained that she was staying at what I believe was another home of her family.
She said she was trying to get better. A few weeks later, she called me from her parents house, very late at night, much later than normal, and was talking to me, while other people seemed to be in her presence, visiting with her. I did not fully understand at the time, but those were visitors, probably family members, visiting her for the last time or times. She could not tell me what was really happening. She did tell me a few personal reasons why she felt that certain other people had disappointed her, which she felt had helped her to feel bad, and that these disappointment may have been a factor in her getting ill. She just said people come and go at various times, to visit her. she was about to go to heaven, but could not tell me. I found out months later after getting no answer on her telephone, which was eventually disconnected, that she had passed away. I found out through her female cousin that lived in the "Sawtelle" area of West Los Angeles, who reluctantly and with sorrow, informed me of her passing, and that cousin was truly sincere and a very nice person. I felt very bad for her entire family. What a tremendous loss. There is not a day that passes that I do not at least for a moment think kindly of her memory. God works in ways that I sometimes do not fully understand. However, I do understand that I look forward to seeing my friend, Carol Iwasaki again, in heaven. Carol's having lived on this planet with us, in some important way, large or small, made our world a better place, and the lives that she touched, were somehow made even better lives.