I buried a very dear friend today

He was the second last of a tontine in which I, now the last one, the heir to stories from a rich estate of memories ,have no one to provide the color and verity needed to make outrageous lifetales believable to those kind enough to stand there and let me babble on
. He was younger than I, a real extreme life devotee. He could have taught Evel Knievel the proper seating posture when jumping several cars while totally stoned.
He was a Viet NAm hero, awarded a silver star for valor and then he gave the medal away cause he was done with it and its'stupidass" meaning. He cared for everyone and he feared noone. His favorite expression always involved kicking the **** out of someone, but, later, upon closer consideration, hed buy a round for the persons and wed make a whole new string in our lattice "network. Manytimes wed bring these new friends to my house and surprise my then wife.
He was too much with his life of , what he called slow- dancing to his grave.Hed been married two times and gotten neither right. This left him lonely and there was nothing i could do about it.When I grew up and married again We tried connecting him many times.These , more often than not, became the sources of even more outrageous tales and lies about how I "fixed him up with this girl from Stanford who couldnt even name a single NAscar driver" Yeh he was a bit of a Red Zoner, by rights We should have always butted heads over our divegrant views on everything from food to politics but he always ended it by putting me in my place witha piece of logic that was impossible to counter.
So with all his lifes travails he decided to speed up living a bit by driving into a stone wall at high speed.The autopsy said he was drunk, but thats not an adequate answer, its way too simplistic.
We both lost another friend by suicide just 2 years ago.I thought that we both got over it together by telling tales of the 3 of us and how wed blow lots of time's capital by really stupid , and many cases, simple minded acts that today wed all
agree were quite improper when measured on ascale where acts of Homer Simpson were a statistical norm.we both convinced ourselves that it wasnt our fault and we had no way of knowing. I still havent convinced myself, now this

Long agoMy friend got me to quit drinking and to terminte my dissipate living by , once getting me through detox, himself submitting to the "program" so we could do it together and then later brag about it to my colleagues and his buddies in a card game. Apparently it tookwell for me but not for him, he must have remained acloset fan of Jack.I was too busy plodding along in my own lifes lane that I never really looked over whenever he was in town to visit to see that he was, apparently hurting badly, and worse , he was drinking more than I could remember.
God but I cant believe hes gone

It was really a great service, he would have really
loved it.They made us buy a coffin to cremate him in, I got into a heated argument with the funeral service , I didnt think hed expect me to take their **** without a decent fight. I lost, apparently its some law that you have to be in a box before theyll stoke you. ANyway We spilled a pitcher on his ashes as we tossed them on a place at my farm and as they played taps, I lost it really good.
Please dont comment , I just needed to tell someone and my wife was too close to us both. She would often make me pitch im out of the house because, drunk as hell, he was scaring the kids with his imitations of ancient rockers , and all i did was encourage him.right now Im overcompensating by following everybody in my family to see that theyre all right and are full of life and eagerly preparing for the future. Im really scared,like Im a death angel . I need to hug my wife and kids and hold them close
God Im gonna miss im. He was my real rudder, he was the strong one of we three . He was Captain AMerica, I was Skipper. I was privileged to have such a friend. I now have just one other close friend remaining, from another of my journeys and Im afraid to go and smother him with some stupid shows of concern and affection. I never thought all these friends could be taken before my eyes.
I am not gonna handle old age well. I now undesrtand that the concept of hell is ,alive while seeing those you love, around you, dying , and theres not a damn thing you can do except watch and cry it out and sadly remember theri lives and their connection with yours

After the service today I bought a bottle of Tangueray and Im sitting here with it . I cracked it and poured one drink and Im lookin at it . It will sure quiet alot of crying in me. boy Tangueray has gone up in price in twelve years.
Thanks for listening. This is a letter I would have written and filed years ago, but I want him to be remembered like the folks in "Our Town" I want there to be heaven for him and the first gone.
Ill probably toss the Tangueray and give the remain der of the bottle to my neighbor. MAybe theyll have some coffee as I bother them tonight. Wee ya later