After the Boys of Summer are Gone

Let's talk about old friends. You know the ones I mean. People you knew when you were younger. People you ran around with when you were in high school or in college. People you thought would be your best friends for life. People you thought you couldn't live without cuz they were like the other half of you. Your best friends. Your blood brothers. You had them. So did I. We all did. But then, something happened. Springsteen sang, "We played king of the mountain out on the end/The world came chargin' up the hill, and we were women and men." And we drifted apart. I dunno why or how. But the stuff of life got in the way. Days and events. New loves, new friends. Crises that nearly broke us. The constant demands of work and family. And the old friends, the ones we were sure we would hang onto for life, faded into the past. They become memories, landmarks in our lives, milestones by which we measure how far we've come. Or haven't. We remember them from time to time, usually when things are going rough, and wonder how they're doing, where they are, what's happened to them. Most of the time, though, they linger in a closet in the back of our memories, ghostly presences waiting to be recalled.

I've lost a lot of friends over the years. It didn't help that I grew up in the military. We were constantly on the move. That made it hard to keep friends. I managed to hold onto one, though. Michael Austin. His father and mine managed - without trying - to get stationed at the same base several times. We were inseparable for a while, and for years after I finally moved away we remained close friends. I even named my first son after him. But something happened. I dunno what. And he was gone. I've neither seen nor heard from him in 30 years. He's dead now, for all I know. In Florida, I hung with Michelle - yeah, the same one I'm with now - and Robin Shanklin, Rick Patrick, Johnny Saez, Lyman Adams. We tore up the gulf coast for two years. Then my family moved again. To Idaho this time, the place that I learned to call home. I had a crew that I hung out with in high school. Bliss Bignall, Doug and Dean Miles, Loren Mason, Rex Dolgner, Mark Bryant, Mark Hunsaker. We lived in each other's houses, in each other's pockets practically. We were never gonna lose contact, were always gonna be friends. But we did the former and not the latter. There's an old song that goes:

John and Lucky saw me off,
The whistle called the time.
Just six days out to the coast,
And just six days behind.
Now I've seen every state since then,
And where my boys have gone
Is known to God and four strong winds,
And I'm here on my own.

You get the idea. I was the first to leave and the first to lose touch. I know where they all are now. The Internet is great for that. We chat from time to time. But it's not the same, ya know. Too much water under the bridge. We've lived separate lives for the past thirty years. We have that connection from all those years ago, but we seem to have very little left in common to talk about. Still, I count them as my friends, but you can only relive the 'good old days" just so many times. Then ya gotta find something else to talk about. Children? Politics? Religion? The weather?

I really don't know where this post is going. I was just thinking about my old friends, and I guess I wanted them to know that they're still my friends, even after all of these decades. Making and keeping friends takes effort. In the world we have created, there seems to not be quite enough time for that. Too bad really. So, to all of my old friends - those I've held onto, those I've lost, and those I've found again - here's to you and to us and to friendship, to the times gone by and the times still to come.

And I promise a less melancholy post later.