I met this kind, funny, gentle, friendly young man when we were both working at Friendly's ...
I met this kind, funny, gentle, friendly young man when we were both working at Friendly's restaurant in Western Massachusetts. We got to know each other well and began to hang out together after work and it blossomed into a wonderful friendship. If not for the social morés of the era, it probably would have become more. We confided in each other and shared our deepest fears, our deepest loves and our deepest sadnesses. And we both had plenty of each. Some of his secrets will go to the grave with me, as I'm sure some of mine did with him.
I can still picture his crooked wry smile just as clearly now, 40 years later, as if no time had passed at all. I even remember his green Monte Carlo coupe. After I had moved away, for a long time my heart would skip a beat every time I saw one that looked like his, thinking it was David.
I've really been caught off guard by how much learning of his death has affected me after the passage of so much time. But life happened, and still in our early 20's David moved to Albany, NY while I moved not long afterwards to Virginia Beach, VA. It was long before the days of the internet and Facebook, and separated by distance and eventually time, we lost touch and lost track of each other.
I occasionally wondered over the years if he thought about me sometimes the way I sometimes thought about him, wondering what had become of him, what he had ended up doing with his life, what path he had chosen. I tried several times to track him down to reconnect, but it was virtually impossible in those days without an address or contact information.
To find out that he David died so very young, so unfairly, sadly young, gives a rude punctuation mark to the close friendship of the two young men that we once were. I don't know how he died; I can only guess. I just hope that he didn't suffer; he was far too deep and kind and sensitive a young man to have to suffer. I weep for him that his life was cut so short, and I weep for myself that I will never again be able to see his smiling face or dry his tears.
I still love you my sweet friend. Rest in peace for eternity. I hope to eventually see you again on the other side.
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