Old Friends

Today I met with an old, old friend.

He was my best friend when I was 7, and 8, and 9. After the fourth grade we did not see each other again until this day. I did not know whether I would even recognize him--but I did, and instantly so. I wondered whether we would find anything to say to one another. We did--much, in fact. I do not remember much about the past (thanks to brain damage). He remembers a good deal of it, and shared what he remembered, and then I remembered too.

Still, we did not talk very much about the past. We talked about what we had done ever since, about what we are doing now. We talked about our children, our families, our wives--just as if we had been friends all along.

I remember now why I had loved him so. Oddly enough, I think maybe he's still my best friend.

All this reminds me of a line from the movie (and the Stephen King story) Stand By Me. Richard Dreyfus plays an older man with children of his own, looking back on an incident of his childhood, remembering his old companions, their adventures, and their closeness. In the present time he is writing a story about it.

And in the end, finishing his manuscript, he writes something like this:

I've never had friends like that since . . .

He sits back for a moment then, thinking, watching his kids and their friends from the window. And then returns to his laptop for one more line.

Jesus, who has?