The Friendship Blog

I've been blog AWOL for over a week and it's mostly Brad Herran's fault for coming to visit. Sure I asked him, and he came, so I guess it's really my fault. When two friends are at fault together, it becomes a good.

Brad and I were roommates in college and best friends.

The first year, 1972-73, we were in adjoining rooms in Bury Hall. I shared a room with Jim "The Missing" Link and Brad sharing with Greg "The Horniest Preacher on Earth" Givili. I was a junior and he was a freshman, and I did exactly what I was supposed to do: I corrupted him from his mid-west sensibilities into a full blown reprobate.

The next year we shared "The Dungeon." The Dungeon was the last room on a dead-end hall with no escape except by the central stairwell. We adorned the room appropriately.

• Bunk beds broken down to make two singles.
• Window glass painted with blue tempera paint, casting a black-light like glow across the room, and making it hard for Campus Security to peer in.
• A clunky two sided metal desk so we could easily face each other while working studiously on term papers (unlikely) or throwing shots of Tequila (a certainty).
• A dorm fridge, electric skillet, and LP record player that would automatically shut off when the last record finished.
• And a toilet seat, hanging on the wall, where if you lifted the lid you found a hippy poster of  Richard Nixon..

I'll not be the first to observe that the great friendships you make in college may well be the most lasting and fulfilling friendships you will ever make.

Like most most maladjusted young men in the 1970's we found our way through life. I graduated first and it took almost two-years to get my first real job. I ended up in Colton, California. When Brad graduated he was smart enough to stay out of Colton, and moved to San Francisco. I got a transfer and ended up in San Francisco too.

The friendship endured.

Over the next couple of years a lot of things changed. Brad's brother Craig moved to San Francisco, and became my roommate in a house I was renting. Brad was living in a communal house in Haight Ashbury where he fell in love, married, and had a bouncing baby girl. Times changed, and I ended up moving to Spokane, Washington. 

And, as men are wont to do, contacts disappeared. Until last March.

Vickie had her spring 6 Women Alone trip to Sonoma, California for wine tasting, hiking and more wine tasting. Vickie needed to get there and it had been a while since I had been in San Francisco, so I decided to try and find my two old roommates who I hadn't seen since around 1985.

Frascati's

I was able to find Craig because we had run into each other when I was still doing Facebook. He had Brad's e-mail and we agreed to get together at a Frascati's at Hyde & Green. 

As Craig said afterward "Funny how you can go years without seeing someone and pick right up like we had seen each other last week."

It's true We were vastly older, but time is a funny thing. It changes with every instant. Yet, when you're with your close friends, it's as if time has never passed at all. 

Until we get reminded with that look in a mirror.

Brad was here for all of last week. He jumped on his BMW and biked from SF to Salem in a single day, in 100+ degree heat. First up: two bottles of Gatorade.

We had a great time. We talked until 2 am most days and slept in until 10 am - DAMN! Just like back in Bury Hall. Only this time we weren't skipping classes. So we did a mini-tour of Oregon.

I asked Brad if he was Ok to walk some distance. He said sure. So we went to Silver Falls State Park and Brad learned that walking on a waterfall tour with Vickie was not like cruising down the hill to pick up some more chocolate in San Francisco. Tired and some heavy breathing but also a big grin.

A drive to the Metolius River and another walk with Vickie up and down the river. A stop at the Head of the Metolius, followed by a drive up to McKenzie Pass.

The Three Sisters from above McKenzie Pass

McKenzie Pass was a kind of "Come to Jesus" moment for Brad, only it was a sea of lava fields dominated by the Three Sisters towering above the scene.  Brad said "I had no idea that there was anything like that in Oregon."

There was only time for him to take a stroll through the lava fields at Dee Wright Observatory, but the sky was as clear and blue as anywhere on earth. 

The only thing that matched it was his grin.

A trip to Albany for some Thai food at House of Noodle, and taking in Music Day on the Summer Solstice in downtown Salem with bands playing for free at a couple of dozen venues and a free harmonica to boot.  And Saturday, it Was the World Beat Festival, and Dragon Boat races.

We talked and talked some more. We wallowed in our mutual hatred of Trump and tried to predict the future. We recounted adventures and highlights.

We are friends. And friends we will be until the end of our lives.