“When I heard Monica’s
voice on the telephone, I
knew what had happened. She
spoke almost coldly, holding
the tears or hysterics back.
Sam had pecked her goodbye
in bed that morning the way
he usually did;
when she got up, she assumed
he’d left for the office
on schedule until she
looked out and saw the Buick
parked in the carport. Sam sat
upright in the driver’s
seat with his eyes open.
Because I am sixty, I have
lost many friends (my mother
who lived to be eighty-
seven looked at newspapers
in her last years only
to read the obituaries)
but Sam and I met
at boarding school, we roomed
together all through college,
and we were best man at each
other’s weddings. We met
when we were new at Holderness,
homesick and lonesome
as we watched the returning
boys greeting each other
after their summers on the Cape.
We took walks, we talked . . .
Our friendship endured college,
political quarrels,
one drunken fistfight, dating
each other’s ex-girlfriends,
hitchhiking, graduation,
and marriage; and survived
although Sam left the East
to settle in Chicago
and drudge for a conglomerate’s
legal department, pleading in court to deny
workmen’s compensation.
I work for the Boston Globe,
considered liberal,
and whenever we met Sam
started right in on me
for the naivete
of my politics. Sometimes
we argued all night long . . .
but I learned: If I refused
to fight, one night at the end
of our visit, after
our wives had gone to bed,
as we drank one more Bourbon
together, Sammy
would admit that he hated what
he did—work, boss, and company.
He wanted to quit;
and he would, too, as soon
as he found another job.
One night he wept
as he told a confusing story
about a man in Florida,
paralyzed for life
when a fork-lift crushed
his spinal cord, who was accused
of being drunk on the job,
which he wasn’t. When Sam’s
department won its case
Sam got a bonus. Of course
he never quit his job
and his salary to work
for Cesar Chavez or sail
his boat around the world.
He spent ten years planning
early retirement and died
six weeks before retiring.
Sam was a good father
and loyal husband most
of the time. In private life
he was affectionate
and loyal. Many people
virtuous in public
privately abuse their wives
and children. Then I think:
‘What about the night-watchman,
paralyzed and cheated?
What about his family?’,
Then I stop thinking.
Sam wrote letters rarely. We met
every couple of years, here
or there, and he called up
impulsively. Last August
Sam and Monica drove
to our place. He looked good
although he wheezed a little.
He referred to someone
by name, as if I should know
about her, and shook his head
sharply, two or three times,
insisting: ‘It was only
an infatuation.’
One night after dinner,
neither of us drinking much
these days, he took his guitar
from the trunk of the car
so that we could sing old
songs and reminisce. On Labor
Day they headed back.
After Monica’s call I dreamed
about Sam all night. Today
I am ten-thousand times
more alive in the rearward
vision of memory
than I am editing stories
by recent college
graduates or typing
’graphs on my green terminal.
I lean back, closing my eyes,
and my sore mind repeats
home-movies of one day:
It’s October, a Sunday
in nineteen-forty-four,
Indian summer bright with
New Hampshire leaves: Sammy
and I walk (happy in our
new friendship, sixteen and
seventeen years old) under
tall sugarmaples
extravagantly Chinese red,
and russet elms still thriving,
enormous and noble
in the blue air.
We talk about the war going on
overseas and whether we
will fight in it; we talk
about what we will do
after the war and college.
I admit: I want to write novels.
Sam thinks maybe
he might be a musician—
he plays guitar and sings
Josh White songs—‘but maybe
it would be better to do
something to help people . . .’
Maybe he should think about
Law School? (I understand:
He feels that his rich father
leads a fatuous life
with his Scotch and his girlfriends.)
Although we talk excitedly,
although we mean what
we say and listen closely
to each other, the real
burden of our talk
is the affection that contains
and exalts us. As it turns dark,
we head back toward school
on a shadowy gravel road;
we are astonished
to see ahead (on a lane
without cars in nineteen-
forty-four, as if an apparition
conjured there
to conclude this day that fixed
our friendship forever)
a small table with a pitcher
on it, three glasses,
and a sign: CIDER 5¢
A GLASS. A screendoor swings
open on the gray unpainted
porch of a farmhouse,
and a woman (old, fat,
and strong) walks down the dirt path
to pour us our cider.
She takes our nickels and sells
us a second glass and then
gives us a third. All day
today I keep tasting
that Sunday’s almost painful
detonation of cider sweet
and harsh in my mouth.”
-
Cider 5¢ a glass
This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 6 Number 6, on page 33
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