I have lost a friend, perhaps the best friend I’ve ever had outside my immediate family.
Elizabeth is, was, my best friend, my mentor, my… I don’t have the words to describe our relationship, but I will try.
Liz came, sought me out, traded and fought to have me in her shop, under her direction. I was angry, I had just completed school for motor rewind, only to find myself shanghaied off to another shop, where I had to learn a whole new set of skills.
It was the best thing that could have happened, for there Liz took me, taught me, showed me what is, to be a leader, and in the process, became my truest friend.
Liz joined the Navy in a time when the Service was more desperate for warm bodies, and they overlooked her treatment for an addiction to heroin, for she was smart, young, strong, and clean. They brought her in, gave her a means to learn, and to advance, and she did both. Along the way she met harassment, glass ceilings, bigotry, and overcame them all. She had lovers, and they shaped her life deeply, for Liz is a lesbian, and they, of course, are forbidden in the Navy.
As camoflauge, Liz married a gay man, who later died of AIDS. Liz’s lovers abaondoned her, too, but I did not, even when she admitted her homosexuality to me.
Liz was the kind of enlisted sailor that every ship needs: Strong (!!), smart, tallented, dedicated, and possessed of true leadership. She was a block of lathe-turned oak; solid, sleek, purposeful, enduring. She was brilliant; educated, thoughtful, creative. She had the ability to lead even the hardest of cases, and so she was given the hardest cases to lead. She could teach, and she did, training young sailors to their trades, and young petty officers to lead. She cared about her ‘kids’, sitting with a critically injured young sailor through the night, holding her hand until it was clear that she would live. Years later, she kept in touch with this young lady to see that she was still OK (she was). Liz sent me with blankets and food to the La Mesa Federal Prison south of Tiajuana for a sailor from our division (though not our shop), when he screwed up south of the border, to make sure he had the minimum necessities in that brutal place, and she slipped in a pack of cigarettes with each day’s run to be sure he had the bartering power to stay out of worse trouble while in that hell-hole. When he was released, she took him into our shop and proceded to straighten him out.
Liz was hard on her troops, but always with a purpose, never capriciously. She taught them the lessons they needed to survive, both in the Nav, and in life. She cried for their heartbreaks, raged at their stupidities, and laughed at their foibles, but never where they could see. That was my priviledge: To be there, to see her caring for them when effective leadership demanded that they not know how much she cared. To lead effectively, she could not let them see how much they mattered, for that would give the worst of them a lever to use against her, to resist all that she would do for them, so in the best interests of her ‘kids’, she pretended to be cold-hearted, though it killed her to do so.
And still, though they pretended to not know, they did know that she cared. Or at least the best of them did, thought they maintained the charrade for the benefit of those whom really needed to not know: The trouble makers. Liz was a stern, but fair and caring aunt to her ‘kids’, and they loved her for it.
I loved her for it.
She taught me all her secrets, and made me the superior, RE-R1, Four-Oh sailor I became.
Liz had two abiding failures when it came to the Nav: She was always right, and she would never back down when right. She fought war after war with venal, mendacious assholes in the chain of command. Never losing a battle, she very nearly lost the war, as she jeapordized her career to do what was right. She was a Petty Officer First Class when I met her, and she stayed on for the next four years, despite being the best Chief Petty Officer Material I’ve ever been priviledged to know. After taking a RIF package during the post-cold war draw-down, she joined the reserves, where the Navy finally came to it’s senses, and gave her the anchors she’d earned years before. While in reserves, she was diagnosed with Hepatitis C, and it was determined to be Service-Related. She was medically retired.
After leaving active service, Liz spent time with her sister, her niece, and the new love of her life, Anne. They bought a house together in Shadyside, Pittsburgh, and lived a quiet life, and prepared to grow old together, but something failed, and their stable, essentially married, life blew apart. Liz was so deeply wounded that she could not even tell me what went wrong. She was always wary of sharing her heart’s content, even with me, and that hurt was too tender to be touched by even the most caring hands.
Hep-C ate away at her, and she went grey before her time. Still, she was the Liz I remember: acerbic, witty, cynical, caring, brilliant. She loved her niece, her new nephew, and my daughter, whom she also claimed as niece.
The last time I saw her was at Rolling Thunder, last year; 300,000 Harley-riding veterans storming through the Nation’s capital on steel hogs, reminding Congress that there are Veterans out there, and they are watching. She rode off on her hog, into the evening, with her lover riding pilon. How romantic, and how appropriate.
I never saw, or heard from, her again.
This morning I learn from her sister, that after more than 25 years Clean and Sober, Liz fell back into her addiction, explaining why I had not heard from her, why she had not returned my messages.
This weekend past, in the 43rd year of her life, Elizabeth took her own life.
I weep. For her, for her few remaining family, for me.
I will never forget sitting on the floor of Liz’s place in Pittsburgh, arguing about life, watching Priness Dianna’s funeral, solving the world’s problems over a cup of coffee.
I will never forget her delight in gifting her niece with a kilt at the Ligonier Highland Games, and then her amusment and delight at turning little Samantha loose on me, the pair of us in kilts, holding hands and walking through the fair.
I will never forget the shy, trusting manner in which she placed her Navy career into my hands with her admission of homosexuality, and I flatter myself to think I was worthy of that trust.
I will never forget the lessons she tought me; technical, leadership, life.
I will never forget Liz.
Fair Winds and Following Seas, my friend. God speed you home.
