The Groomsmen
I was recently talking to my wife about the groomsmen I had at my wedding and it reminded me about my friend Chris. Now, I grew up in the country at a time in history where, during nice weather, I’d leave home early in the day and not come home until dusk. Parents, please don’t give analytical people squishy targets like “be home by dusk”. I understand now that sunset time changes through out the year but to a pre-teenage boy with a logical mind, I had a hard time figuring when dusk was supposed to be.
Sorry, got side tracked. Anyway, the nearest kids my age lived about a mile away.Two brothers, Howard, my age and Chris, his younger brother of two years. Howard and I were friends but not good friends. The crowd I ran with, kids another mile or so away, was a closed group. By the time I started driving, I got a job to pay for my car and priorities changed.
When I graduated High School and went to college, I changed jobs and started selling women’s shoes. We got paid the higher of 10% commission or minimum wage ($3.35 per hour as I recall). Because I was working around going to college, I was making about $10/hr on a pretty consistent basis. Chris also sold shoes for a different shoe store owned by the same person.
Two years later, Chris decided to go to the same college that I was now a junior at and we shared a dorm room. I had made plans that I wanted a single dorm room for my senior year in college. Outside of that, Chris and I spent a lot of time doing things together and traveling to the mall to work.
Two more years later, Chris was the best man at my wedding and was just started dating the best friend of my new wife. Chris dropped out of college and started working full time at the shoe store. In fact, for a while, he lived with us (before we left town).
About 5 years later, I was the best man at his wedding. They had a little girl. She was about 2 (I have to warn you that I’m already tearing up as I’m trying to put this together) when he found out that he had a rare cancer. At that time, the internet was a new thing and Chris did a lot of research on his particular type of cancer. From what he found out, the best scenario was to delay death and the best case he could find would put him living to see his daughter graduate high school (barely). That became his primary goal.
He found out that The University of Ohio had doctors with more experience with this type of cancer than anywhere else (they lived in Little Rock, AR) so they made arrangements to have it treated there. I won’t go through the painful part of the treatment not working or the debilitating effects he got from the treatment or even that he blamed himself for having the occasional cigarette at bars in college as why he got cancer. These things are too painful for me to write about even 25 years later. He passed away.
Chris was a beautiful person that had a wonderful sense of humor and was always optimistic. He was always willing to listen and provide feedback when asked. He was the kinda guy where you could pick up a conversation from several months ago as though no time had elapsed. I miss him almost as much as I miss my parents who have also passed away. There is an anniversary clock in our living room that I’ll always have fixed no matter the cost.
“And he said to them, ‘Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him’; and he will answer from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything’? I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs. And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!’“ - Luke 11:5-13
“A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” - Proverbs 18:24
Each of us have had those special friends in our lives. Chris was a special friend to me.
