Several people in my life have been “a best friend,” but my longest lived friendship is with Charlie.
We met when we were in fourth grade. Charlie came riding up the street on his bike with a hypodermic full of water, squirting people and trying to poke them with it. While we lived a few blocks apart and saw each other often enough, we went to different schools and didn’t start hanging out together until we were in the same homeroom in 7th grade.
Charlie was slight, but agile, and was a very smart irrepressible smart-ass. His father was a competitive cardiovascular surgeon who was never around and his mother was a pillhead who stayed in bed for months at a time. The only supervision in his life was their maid.
Sometime in 7th grade I was spending the night at Charlie’s and we made a dummy by stuffing clothes full of other clothes and topped it off with a sombrero. The idea (and why it seemed like a good one has faded from memory) was to hide in the bushes on the next street over and throw it at passing cars, meanwhile screaming in simulated agony. The second car we hit was a cop.
We skedaddled back to Charlie’s and imagined we’d made a clean getaway. But watching from the closet window, we soon saw a police car pull up to the house. And another. Three. Four.
And as these four cops conferred on the sidewalk…Charlie’s parents arrived home! Yikes!
We were soon standing in the living room facing Dr. Charlie Dad, Mom and four cops. The captain asked me, “Ringo, were y’all hiding in the bushes, throwing a dummy at cars and screaming?”
“No, sir,” I lied.
Then he asked Charlie the same thing.
Charlie said, “Yes, sir, we were throwing a dummy at cars and screaming.”
I’ll never forget suddenly grasping the meaning of feeling two inches tall.
But the most important lesson came right on the heels of that. Nothing happened to us.
Dr. Dad thanked the cops and they left. Then he told us to stay inside and watch TV.
Charlie and I, and a group of friends, went on to enjoy much mayhem, and occasionally got caught. We had a good basic plan (split up), and, with one exception, we never both got caught again.
I must abbreviate. He got an electric guitar right about the time I got my first drum kit. We played music. We did our best to be bad boy teenagers, and as a result spent much of our teen years in the company of the girls who liked to hang out with the bad boys.
Charlie dropped out in 10th grade and got married. Yet another place I could hang out with no adults around.
Later, we were roommates in college (I was an undergrad, and he was in law school). More adventures ensued, and it soon became apparent to me that Charlie’s legal education was a good thing.
Shortly after I graduated and began working for an oil company, I was able, despite not knowing diddley about the business, to get Charlie into a lucrative drilling deal (that I couldn’t touch).
And I’ve enjoyed free legal counsel from a crackerjack attorney. Besides advice, he’s represented me, to good result, in legal actions.
We’ve commiserated through countless life events over the past several decades.
He lives in Austin, and I’m in Houston. I see him and his wife about 12-15 times a year. He’s got a stepdaughter and two daughters, the youngest of which entered college this fall. Something I’ve noticed with other friends kids happened with the girls. Somewhere around age 17 they suddenly notice that you’ve been around all of their lives, and they become - what? - sort of attached. I’m a quasi-uncle to them, and that’s great.
The last time I passed through Austin was the weekend before last. Early on Sunday morning, I stopped at their place. I let myself in and could hear that they were just rousing, so I fired up the TV and settled in on the couch. D, his wife (3rd - they’ve been together a long time now and it works - I don’t know what he was thinking the first two times - neither does he), came out of the bedroom and discovered me. She was pleased - we get along very well - and went to fetch Charlie. I know Charlie likes to hit golf balls on Sunday mornings; i.e., nothing big likely scheduled, so I took the chance he might want to grab some breakfast at Cisco’s. And that’s what we did.
And then I drove on into Houston.
So, that’s my friend Charlie. Hey Charlie! 40 years, fucker!
Glad you asked.
