Touchstone, as defined in the dictionary, is “a test or criterion for the qualities of a thing.” That definition should be amended to include not only things, but people as well, particularly long time friends. People who, even after long separations, can telephone or walk in and fall into conversation as if they had seen you only yesterday. Don Natoli and John McGrory are such people; I call them touchstone friends.
I met Don in the fifth grade at Saint Ambrose parochial school in Endicott, NY (circa1945). We remained classmates until graduation from high school, and then went our separate ways. He has, however, remained a constant throughout my life, dropping in out of the blue, so to speak, to resume the easy conversation common to long-time friends.
We shared many experiences during our school years, one of which I wrote about in a story called The Football Game. Another was a weekend trip to Québec to visit the shrine of Saint Anne de Beaupré, just 30 miles east of Québec City. We made the trip in Don’s 1938 Plymouth and that in itself was an adventure. We slept in the car the first night, parked just off a main highway in Canada where we could not only hear, but feel the ‘whoosh’ of large trucks speeding by. We made it to the shrine the next day, looked around at all the discarded crutches and canes, and then got back into the car to begin the journey home by way of the New England states. We made one stop for food in the afternoon, somewhere in Québec, where we discovered that no one spoke English. As I recall, we had little difficulty getting the attractive young counter-girl to make us a couple of sandwiches and a bowl of soup. We then decided, after eating, to drive straight through the states of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and into Connecticut, where we planned on staying for a day with a former high school friend who was living in Hartford.
Darkness descended on us somewhere in Maine and Don decided that he would drive until he got tired – it was, after all, his car. I was getting sleepy just riding along with nothing much to do or see, so I climbed into the spacious back seat for a nap. I don’t really recall how much time passed, but I heard Don say “OK, wake up; it’s your turn to drive.” As soon as I had my wits about me I saw Don slide out from behind the steering wheel while keeping his foot on the gas pedal. I said something like “What the hell are you doing?” and he replied “Making room for you; climb over.” The car never slowed down as we switched places without smashing into anything. I don’t remember much of the drive after that, it was just a long stretch of dark, or barely illuminated highway; there were no super highways in those days.
We finally found our friend’s place in Hartford, slept for a couple of hours, had something to eat, then went for a tour of the city with our friend and one of his buddies. We ended up, as I recall, at a swimming area where we enjoyed the rest of the afternoon, then headed for home while there was still plenty of daylight remaining. The whole adventure took just about three days. I never did calculate the number of miles that we traveled, but it had to have been close to a thousand.
Several years later, after Don had returned from military service in Germany, I was an usher in his wedding – he was Best Man in mine.
Years turned into decades, but Don was always in touch. He would visit my mother when she was in the nursing home slipping further and further into that twilight existence that we know as late stage Alzheimer’s disease. He did it for as long as he could until the sheer futility of it all overwhelmed him. I’ll always be grateful for his effort. I, in turn, tried to comfort him while he sat with his dying mother whom I loved almost as much as my own. He’d call me when his spirits were at rock bottom and he needed to talk. I was glad that he thought to call me at those times, I was more than happy to offer what little support that I could. I know that if I really was in need he would, if I asked, help to the best of his ability whether it had been weeks, months or years since we had seen one another. He is much more than a fair weather friend.
Then there is John, a fellow I met at work in the mid-sixties (as near as I can recall), we worked together for a relatively short time. He had, and has to this day, more drive than anyone else I know. I’ve heard such drive referred to as “… a fire in the belly”, so it wasn’t at all surprising that he moved on to bigger and better jobs that took him and his family all over the country.
We had a casual friendship at work, and shared some funny and not so funny experiences like the stag party that the fellows at work had for him at a restaurant in Binghamton just a few days before he was to be married. Naturally, John had a bit too much to drink that evening, as most guys do in that situation, and several of us offered to drive him home safely. He, being the stubborn Irishman that he is, would have none of it and drove off into the night, alone, headed for the Bevier Street Bridge that crossed the Chenango River. The road turned slightly to the right about one hundred and fifty feet before the bridge… John didn’t. He went off the road and rolled down a slight incline before coming to a halt at the river’s edge. Thankfully, he hit nothing more than a guardrail and some underbrush that quickly slowed his speed causing him to hit his face on the car’s steering wheel.
Word of the accident spread around work the next morning; we heard that John was in the hospital overnight, and that one of his brothers was driving up from Philadelphia to take him home in time for his wedding. Another co-worker and I decided to stop at the hospital to see how badly John was injured and to see if we could be of any help. We were about to enter an elevator but had to wait until two passengers disembarked. As we brushed past them one mumbled something that stopped us in our tracks – it was John, his face all swollen and bandaged to the point that he was unrecognizable. We spoke for a couple of minutes, learned that he was relatively OK, and that he and his brother would leave directly for home. He must have been a sight to behold at the wedding ceremony. He told me, later, that the wedding photos looked like “Beauty and The Beast”; they were eventually re-touched. That may have been an improvement, but I couldn’t swear to it.
My favorite remembrance is of one crisp Saturday in the winter. We were working a half-day, and were leaving the plant to get to our respective cars in the parking lot. Now I was getting to a point where my balance was rapidly deteriorating, and if there was something over which to trip – a gum wrapper, a dead fly, a large dust bunny – I would usually trip over it and wind up on my butt. This particular day was bright and sunny, and the snow and ice in the parking lot had almost melted away. I say “almost” because there was a postage stamp sized patch of ice that inevitably found its way under my feet… down I went.
Try as I might, I was unable to regain my footing and John was unable to help me up for some reason that I now can’t recall. So, I suggested that he drive his car right up to me where I could grasp the bumper and perhaps use it to help myself up. It sounded like a plausible solution so he drove right up to within a foot of where I was sitting. I grabbed the bumper and tried to lift myself to an upright position, but it was not to be.
As we mulled the situation over, John spotted another worker leaving the plant headed in our direction; there weren’t many of us working that morning. When it became obvious that this other person would not pass close to us, John hailed him, saying “Can we have a little help over here? My friend is drunk and he can’t get up.” I couldn’t help but burst out laughing, though I managed to set the ‘good Samaritan’ straight as he helped John get me to my feet. I can recall this vividly even though it’s been some forty years since it happened. Humor is a wonderful thing that helps get me through some difficult times… John has a well developed sense of humor and I honestly think that he has half of someone else’s. Most of his many phone calls to me over the years have not started with the traditional “Hello”, but rather with his typical “Hey, you sick S-O-B, how the hell are you doing?” John, I’m happy to say, is one-of-a-kind and a damned funny one at that.
These people are my touchstone friends; one of them lives within thirty miles of me, the other lives some two thousand miles across the country. Both are cherished.
F. A. Zedik
12-23-06