Cocktail Parties, Pink Floyd, and Mint Jelly on Lamb. A Friend’s Passing

I learned of a friend’s passing this week.
It came this way:
“FWD: Linwood died last Tuesday.”

It took my breath away.
It came from one of my best friends.

He and I share a few Holly Golightlys.

People who come and go but leave a huge influence and imprint. The right people for the right time. I’m fortunate to share these people with dear friends. Collective memory creates a lasting connection.

Often, I look at myself and see all the people who made me who I am. Like when we’d diagram a sentence in grade school, back when structure was taught. Draw that diagram of your life, though. See the ebbs and flows. The forks have street names associated with them. The names of those who guided you along the path that brought you to this very moment.

I deserved to hear about his passing in a forwarded text.
I didn’t keep in touch.
I should have.

Some people are so present in your heart that they’re always there.
You take it for granted.

Way before cell phones, our friendship started in the AOL era when Instant Messenger was how you kept in touch and made plans. I remember one time he told me about seeing my screen name as “active” and how he didn’t need to reach out. Just knowing I was alive, well, and online was enough. The internet was new. What once was maybe a cosmic connection was becoming virtual.

My memories of times with him since those days were always there. They always would be.
I should have kept in touch.

Vonnegut: “So it goes.”

Linwood was a friend.
He was a mentor. I’d go as far as to say he was one of the most significant mentors I ever had.

I met him when I was in my early twenties and in college. He must have been 20 (could it have been 30?) years my senior. I was knee-deep in school and thinking about the future. He showed me what adulthood could be. He taught me more than college ever could during that time in my life.

He had cocktail parties, an excellent music collection, and a Pink Floyd poster, framed, with a dab of color from the print matched to paint his walls. He cooked easy but good food and taught me my first recipe to impress friends. I made it for my dad on a visit home from college and felt like a grownup. Linwood introduced me to wine at a time when all I knew was cheap booze and that you could put mint jelly on lamb.

For me, his door was always open.

I’ve learned since that wasn’t always the case for others. He could be a curmudgeon. I’m the eternal optimist. Maybe our yin and yang worked for him. I never saw that side of him. Maybe I softened him.

I should have kept in touch.

Through Linwood, I got a job at a radio station. He was on the radio. In addition to aviation, I was a journalism student.

He loved words and diction. He told me the last letter of a word is as important as the first. He taught me to pronounce Slobodan Milošević after hearing me struggle with it on the radio. He would correct me on things like “who” vs. “whom.” I listened to him.

He listened to my naïve ideas of love and heartache.

He told me there would be more and they would be beautiful. The bad ones are more memorable than the good ones for a reason, he said while taking a long drag on a cigarette.

He introduced me to a friend who traded my labor for a Tarot card reading.

He told me about art in more palpable ways than I ever read in books. This was my college.

He had Valentine’s Day dinner parties where you never sat with your date. His house would have tables for two, four, or six set up throughout. Between courses, we guests would draw cards to see where we’d sit. You were forced to meet and talk to everyone. In my twenties, he taught me how to engage.

He hosted a dinner party where he chose what duo would make each course. He’d pair you with a partner you might never have met. Through that event, I made a lifelong friend. 

I was much Linwood’s junior, but I never felt that way. Now that I’m likely the age he was when we met, I think we both brought life to each other at the right time. Maybe I mentored him, too.

An eye to the future for me, and grounding in reality for him.

As is always the case, these are questions that will go unanswered.

I should have kept in touch. 

But knowing he was there and alive was enough. His presence was felt and still will be.

Even after his passing.

We are a bit of everyone we’ve met.