For Fred

 It has been a little more than six years since I published a blog post I called Oscar and Felix, a post in which I wrote about a friend of mine that read as follows:

A friend of mine tapped the window of my school bus one morning early last week...and said, 

“My son came to visit last night.”

“That was nice” I said.

“No it wasn’t,"  he said. "He had a cold and I got angry.' Don’t you know that at our age your mother and I are susceptible to colds?’”

“And what did he say?”

“He said he wanted some soup.” 

I laughed.

“So I made him some soup and told him not to touch anything.”

By this time I felt as though I were playing Oscar to his Felix, and I wanted to move back a step or two, but I was sitting inside my bus and he was standing outside it. 

“Fred,” I said, “does it ever surprise you when you hear about someone’s death? Someone who’s younger than you?” At 76, Fred is a year younger than me.

“I think about it all the time,” he said.

I do too.

Because Fred died last month, I would like to honor him here. 

Fred was a retired Army sergeant and a Vietnam Vet. He and I used to talk about Vietnam a lot. But mostly we talked about what came after - for each of us. 

Upon his return from Vietnam, Fred began to drink heavily until his family, seeing what was happening, intervened. He then began group therapy at a local VA hospital, which became his salvation.  

Fred was my first friend when I went to work at a new

location. What I want to say to him is: I miss you, and thank you. We will meet again - in death and in friendship.