dedalus_1947 | Friends Vanished and Gone (Reply)

I walked the avenue till my legs felt like stone.

I heard the voices of friends vanished and gone.

At night I could hear the blood in my veins;

Black and whispering as the rain.

On the streets of Philadelphia.

Ain’t no angel gonna greet me;

It’s just you and I my friend.

My clothes don’t fit me no more.

I walked a thousand miles

Just to slip this skin.

The night has fallen, and I’m lying awake.

I can feel myself fading away.

So receive me brother with your faithless kiss,

Or will we leave each other alone like this

On the streets of Philadelphia.

(Streets of Philadelphia, Bruce Springsteen: 1993)

Captain Jean Luc Picard of the Starship Enterprise was just about to lash out at the time-traveling Q of the Continuum for causing the death of his crew when the phone rang. I ignored the annoying chimes until Kathy called out from the kitchen.
“Tony, can you get that please. My hands are wet”.

I shot a glance across the sofa at Toñito totally engrossed, watching the Star Trek: the Next Generation episode titled “All Good Things…”, and reconsidered passing the telephone buck to him.

“All right” I said, grudgingly, “I’ll get it.” I walked angrily into the study and picked up the receiver on the desk, next to the computer. “Hello?” I said, trying not to sound irritated at this interruption of the final episode of the series.

“Hello” said an unfamiliar male voice. “May I speak with Tony, the hospice volunteer, please?”

“This is Tony, speaking” I replied. “How can I help you?” I was mystified by the call. My only hospice contact was Jan, the program coordinator. No one else in the program ever called me, and few people knew of my involvement.

“Hi Tony” the stranger said. “You may not remember me. My name is Robert and I’m a friend of Sam and Ruth. I met you once when I visited Sam in the hospice. Ruth asked me to call you”.

“Okay” I said, still puzzled about the nature of this call, and how he had managed to reach me.

“We called Jan at Kaiser and she gave us your number. She said it would be alright to reach you at home. I hope I’m not calling you at a bad time, but Ruth insisted. She wanted to thank you for your kindness in visiting Sam these last five months. She saw you there yesterday, and she wanted you to know that Sam died this afternoon”.

“Oh” I said, stunned into silence. Robert matched my numbed response with a longer pause. I finally broke the stalemate by saying “I’m sorry to hear that”.

“Ruth told us how much your visits meant to her and Sam. She wanted you to know as soon as possible”.

“Thank you, it was nothing” I replied dumbly, realizing too late how stupid it sounded. “It was kind of you to call” I added quickly, rattling my head side-to-side to become more lucid and alert. “How is Ruth doing?”

“As well as can be expected; she was with him at the end, and he went peacefully”.

“I never suspected it was so close” I muttered, remembering how peacefully Sam was resting in bed during my visit. He had reached out to take hold of my hand as I adjusted his blanket, and I held him that way until Ruth entered the room to relieve me. I’d been embarrassed at first by her discovery of this physical contact, but she only smiled at me and told me she could take it from here. There had been no hint that he would die so quickly. There was nothing more to say, so I didn’t try. I simply waited for Robert to speak again.

“Well, Tony, I just want to add how much I admire the work you’re doing. Thank you”.

“You’re welcome” I said, stumbling to recall his name. “Thank you for calling”. I remained seated in the desk chair for uncounted moments after I replaced the receiver, not sure what I was feeling after this news. I finally stood up and returned to my place on the sofa. A commercial was on the screen and Toñito was looking at a magazine. “So Toñito” I said, desperately wishing I knew what to do or feel, “what did I miss?”

It all started on another evening in front of the television set. We were watching the 66^th Academy Awards Ceremony on March 21, 1994. Participation in the Oscars was a family ritual in those days when Toñito was a sophmore and an aspiring high school actor, and Prisa was a mercurial 8^th grader who, while disdaining Toñito’s involvement in drama, was nevertheless a passionate movie and television fan. Kathy and I tried catching as many of the nominated films as possible, and we enjoyed handicapping their chances of winning. 1993-94 was a mixed bag for movies, with popular contenders alongside heralded independents. That year we all had different favorites. I’d been deeply moved by the movie, Philadelphia, and listening to Bruce Springsteen performing the nominated song during the ceremonies confirmed my choice. I held my breath as the list of nominees for Best Actor was read. They were Liam Neeson for Schindler’s List, Tom Hanks in Philadelphia, Laurence Fishburne in What’s Love Got to Do with It, Daniel Day Lewis for In the Name of the Father, and Anthony Hopkins in The Remains of the Day. I whooped and cheered when Tom Hanks’ name was announced as the winner. He bounded up the stage of the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion to receive his award. What he said next stunned me. I’d expected the traditional litany of thanks to cast and crew, sprinkled with some humorous anecdotes. I was not prepared to hear a testimonial to teachers and friends, a requiem on AIDS and its devastation, and an appeal for tolerance and compassion (Tom Hanks’ Acceptance Speech at the 66^st Academy Awards Ceremony). Hanks thanked two people who inspired him in high school, his drama teacher and a friend, who were both gay. He also looked to a time when we could openly acknowledge people for what they do, and not their sexuality. His speech acted as an off-shore drilling rig in my mind, diving through the past years of my life and then boring into the hard crust of my memory. His words finally struck a hidden reservoir of shame. The movie, the song, and Tom Hanks’ speech unleashed a series of images in my head. I thought of the faces of gay colleagues, teachers and counselors who had died of AIDS, and I thought of Wayne, a dear high school and college friend, with whom I’d lost contact after my marriage in 1975.

Until the 1990’s the teaching profession maintained a polite code regarding homosexuality. It wasn’t as simplistic as the military’s “Don’t ask; don’t tell” policy. Teachers held to a more “civilized” and genteel standard that found expression in the Seinfeld remark, “I’m not gay; not that there’s anything wrong with that!” Educators maintained the polite illusion that our profession was solidly heterosexual, but sprinkled with a few “confirmed bachelors” and “single working women”. The onset of a mysterious sexually transmitted disease (at least at first) in the late 80’s ripped the cover off that fanciful myth. Friends and colleagues, who I worked with, suffered and celebrated with, were dying. Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) was the insidious scourge of the decade because it killed secretly and silently. Friends and colleagues would become weak, ill and then disappear from offices, schools, and life. Eventually I would ask a mutual friend, “I haven’t seen Vern in a long time! Where is he working now?” I would receive an awkward reply after a long pause, “Oh, didn’t you know, he died.., of pneumonia, I believe.” It seemed that impaired immune systems were most susceptible to pneumonia. Hearing Tom Hanks’ words, made me think of AIDS patients as “los desaparecidos”, the “vanished ones” who developed AIDS and disappeared from jobs, schools, and offices. I had allowed too many of my friends to pass away without DOING ANYTHING. I never recognized them as gay, I never visited them, and I never attended their funerals. Thinking of so many vanished teachers and counselors brought slow tears of sadness and regret. Then I thought of Wayne.

Wayne was my crossroads friend in high school and college. Before meeting Wayne, friendships were seasonal. The “best friends” I had in 8^th grade were different from my best friends in each successive grade. That changed with Wayne. He became a soul-mate who refined friendship into an honest and expanding relationship. Wayne and I first met in our sophomore year as political outcasts on the school’s running track taking laps for Barry Goldwater. We were the only students foolish enough to raise our hands in support of the conservative Republican nominee for president in 1963. Our youthful libertarianism and self-inflated intellects united us, and we maintained a casual acquaintance until our senior year. That year Wayne asked me to join him as editor of the school newspaper, The Viking. The time we spent writing, editing, and publishing the school newspaper in the Viking Office was the beginning of a six-year collaboration.

That year, our fellowship grew to include two additional classmates, Jim, Greg, and eventually John, Jim’s younger sibling (See Sons of Pioneertown). It was a brotherhood forged at a crucial time. All four of us were leaving high school and we were scared and uncertain. Wayne, however, seemed more self-assured, with a clearer sense of direction. Wayne was the pathfinder of the group, with a plan for college and life. He would go to Loyola University, live away from home, and join a fraternity. We, on the other hand, struggled to get by. I lived at home and went to UCLA; Jim and Greg attended Santa Monica College. Wayne was also the troubadour who ignited our wanderlust for freedom and adventure by convincing us that as young, independent college men, all we needed was a map, a Volkswagen bus, and sleeping bags. During our college years we traveled through central California, exploring Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Big Sur and Monterey. Independence was a necessity for Wayne. After one year in the dorms, he and a frat brother moved into an apartment near school, but he eventually settled in a bachelor pad in Hermosa Beach in his junior year. He had girl friends in high school and dated often, but he became mysterious about his emotional involvements in college. He finally admitted to living with a girl for a short time, but I never met her. Ultimately, John (who had returned from two tours in Vietnam) took over the single flat, and Wayne, Jim, and Greg all moved into a nearby apartment on Monterey Boulevard.

A migration of sorts occurred after Wayne and I graduated from college in 1970. John and Greg moved to Long Beach, Jim to Cerritos, and Wayne to Venice. We occasionally got together for card games and trips, but I felt that a major realignment in grouping and affections was taking place. Wayne never joined us for Saturday morning games of football, basketball, and baseball, and it became harder and harder to schedule and include him in other activities. We could not account for his growing indifference to “hanging out”. We decided that he must have gotten involved with drugs, and the three of us organized an intervention to confront him. Throughout dinner that night he listened patiently to our observations, and smiled benignly at our conclusions. When we finished our testimony he told us not to worry, because he was not addicted to anything. In fact, he announced, he was free of the sexual repressions that had plagued him. He told us that he was gay. I pretended to take this revelation in stride, but I was secretly shocked and dismayed. I didn’t know what “being gay” meant, and I didn’t feel capable of discussing it with Wayne, or my friends. I did mention it to my father; but he turned my question around and asked what could I do about it? I wanted to believe that Wayne was on another temporary trailblazing course. Just as he was the first to leave home and live alone, travel around the state, and co-habit with a girl, I saw homosexuality as another “first”. Being gay carried an avant-garde mystique; it was hip, cool, “in”- and Wayne was always trying to be all three. Ultimately, I did nothing. In the months that followed our needless intervention, the separation from Wayne grew wider. I enlisted in the Air Force, Greg moved to Riverside to finish college, and Jim and John left school to work full time for a burglar alarm company. We lost track of Wayne until Greg rediscovered him in the spring of 1975 operating an antique shop on Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice, California.

Our reaction to finding Wayne was like recovering the Prodigal Son, we rejoiced and celebrated. He looked strong, healthy and tanned. He had been living in San Francisco but decided it was time for him and his partner to come home. He seemed especially eager to learn what we had been doing. Greg was teaching at a Catholic elementary school, and John was a paramedic for the Los Angeles Fire Department. Jim had stayed at the burglar alarm company and was now a supervisor and I had finished my graduate work at UCLA and was getting married in August. Wayne took the initiative in arranging a reunion dinner at his home behind the store. There we met his partner Kevin, a slim, sandy-haired young man who seemed smart, practical, and very handy at plumbing and construction. I believed that I had come to terms with Wayne’s homosexuality and was accepting of Kevin. The moment of truth came when Kathy and I were addressing wedding invitations and she asked me, “Should I write ‘Wayne and guest’; or just Wayne on the envelope?”

“Are you kidding” I exclaimed indignantly. “Why should we invite Kevin to our wedding? He’s Wayne’s friend not mine.”

Kathy looked at me oddly and remarked, “You don’t think it’s strange that all your high school friends are in the wedding party, but you’re not inviting Wayne’s partner?”

“No” I lied. In those early days, I was still immune to my wife’s reasoning and intuition. Her question annoyed me exactly because I did not want to consider that I was wrong.

“Alright” Kathy said in resignation, “he’s your friend, so it’s your decision; but it’s wrong”.

Wayne did not attend my wedding, and soon after his antique shop had a new name and owner. I never saw him again.

On Oscar night I cried when Tom Hanks spoke. I cried for the thousands and thousands of men and women who had died in this plague, and for the sufferings they sustained in loneliness and isolation. I especially thought of Wayne and the teachers and counselors I knew who had simply disappeared during this time. At that moment I knew I had to DO SOMETHING. If it was too late to reach out and help those who were gone, I needed to do something for the living. I needed to help people, not mourn the vanished and the dead. That was my first step to the Hospice Program.

I parked around the corner from Saticoy Convalescence, a nursing and rehabilitation center. Locking the car, I was feeling strong and optimistic. I had spent 3 months completing the hospice training with Jan and a group of eleven volunteers. The sessions had not been particularly difficult, and they were a great distraction from my work as a principal. I silently reviewed the lessons and Jan’s advice: "be friendly and open, but most of all be honest". I attached my Hospice clip-on badge, with its photo ID, and walked through the door. “Hi” I said confidently, to the short, dark complexioned nurse at the desk. “I’m a hospice volunteer to see Sam Goldberg. Can you help me find him?”

“Oh hello” she responded, looking at my badge and then my face. “Happy to meet you; Sam is one of our nicest patients. He just had lunch. I’ll take you to his room.”

We walked into the semi-lit room to find a little man sitting in a chair by the window.

“Sam” the nurse said, walking to the bed and straightening the covers. “You have a guest”.

“Hello, Sam” I said, extending my hand as I walked toward him. “My name is Tony, and I’m a volunteer in the Kaiser Hospice program. I was asked to come by and see if it was all right for me to visit you?”

Sam jumped out of the chair and shook my hand energetically. He was a small man, frail and skinny, with wispy grey hair combed neatly to the side. The bathrobe he wore seemed to swallow him up in it folds, but he stood ramrod straight as he spoke.

“I’m pleased to meet ya” he said, in a mild New York accent, with a touch of cockney. “My name is Samuel Goldberg. Would you like to hear my story?”

“Why yes” I replied, surprised at the sudden invitation. I’d expected more polite preliminaries before asking questions, but Sam was getting right to business. “I’d be happy to hear your story”.

Sam pointed to a chair and I sat down, looking in wonder at this little man who loomed above me. He stood at rigid attention, as if preparing to salute before giving a report to his commanding officer. Keeping his head straight and eyes forward, Sam cleared his throat and began speaking:

“I was born in Liverpool in 1921. My parents emigrated there from Poland. My father worked as a tailor and my mother was a seamstress. I was an average student, but as soon as I was old enough I left home and went to sea. My parents wanted me to stay in school and become a teacher or a rabbi, but I wanted to get out and see the world. I wanted to explore the cities I’d read about in books. It wasn’t easy being Jewish in the British Merchant Marine in those days, but I was a tough sailor and not afraid to use my fists. I never told my father about those fights. He believed that Great Britain was a great country and all its citizens sweet and accepting. They were certainly better than the Poles and Russian he knew as a child, but they weren’t perfect. He never had a high opinion of the Merchant Marine. He called us sea gypsies until the war started, and then we became heroes. It was at the start of the war that I met Ruth and fell in love”.

I sat transfixed. Jan had told us how many hospice patients felt compelled to “tell their story”, but I hadn’t expected such a sudden and deliberate recitation. With glazed eyes looking over my head, Sam went on as if I weren’t there. I learned how Ruth, the shy and lovely rabbis daughter was attracted to the humorous and cocky seaman, who told exciting stories of the North Atlantic. They married and he insisted that she move in with relatives in the country whenever he was at sea. They survived the war only to discover that most of their relatives in Poland died in the concentration camps. Ruth’s father was able to assist their move to America after the war, and he helped Sam find a position with a commercial shipper in New York. Sam said he was sick of the Old World, with its deep-seated prejudices and hate, and wanted a new life. America seemed to offer true opportunities. They continued heading West, finally making their way to California. He worked in San Francisco and Los Angeles, until retiring seven years before. They never had children, but maintained many friends, acquaintances, and a few relatives who had immigrated to Beverly Hills. He still loved the sea, and they took yearly cruises to old and new ports-of-call. After a trip to Cancun, he was diagnosed with a terminal case of prostate cancer. He said he was happy with his life and not afraid to die. His only regret was leaving Ruth alone. They had been married 54 years.

“I’m feeling a little tired now” he concluded. “I think I’ll get into bed”.

“Uhhh, would you like me to leave?” I asked.

“No, no”, he replied, “don’t go yet. Stay and visit”.

That was how I met Sam. Over a period of 5 months, from December to April, I visited him twice a week, for 10 to 30 minutes at a time. I would sit, talk, or read. I kept him company until Ruth or another friend came to take my place. A few days after his death, I received a phone call from Ruth. She apologized for not informing me of the funeral, but said that Sam had wanted a private service. However, she insisted that I accept her invitation for dinner. She politely dismissed all my excuses, saying it was important for her that I come. I finally relented. On the evening of the dinner, I took my son and daughter for companionship and security. I was very nervous because I had never attended a Jewish “Shiva”, a meal and gathering during the seven-day mourning period after burial. Robert was there with his wife, along with another couple. Ruth was delighted that my children had come, and she spent much of the time quizzing them about school and their outside interests. I had expected to witness some ritual or ceremony, but the evening consisted of talk, memories of Sam, laughter, and lots of food. The guests were especially curious of the Hospice Volunteer Program, and peppered me with questions about it. Later, as we prepared to leave, Ruth made a point of taking me aside for a private conversation. She explained that the Jewish funerary tradition consisted of nine stages; beginning with Mitzvot of Bikur Cholim, the “mitzvah” (act of kindness) of visiting the sick, and ending with Shiva and Yahrzeit, the “mitzvot” (acts) of comforting the mourners and remembering the dead. She said I had been a special and unexpected gift in their lives. I was the stranger who had chosen to visit Sam out of kindness, and became the comforting friend who honored his memory after death. She kissed me and thanked me.