Larry

Larry

I met Larry in the Air Force. We both joined up about the same time in April of 1969. We both came in from the New York City (NYC) area but Larry came through the Whitehall Street induction center in Manhattan (the same induction center referred to in the Arlo Guthrie song “Alice's Restaurant”) while I came in through the Fort Hamilton induction center in Brooklyn. Larry was a city kid. He grew up in the Bronx, one of the boroughs of New York City, the only one of the five boroughs on the mainland. I grew up on Long Island which includes Brooklyn. It occupies the southwest corner of the island. Larry and I were inducted within a week or two of each other. We did basic training in barracks that were right across from each other but we never ran into each other as during basic training everyone is pretty much restricted to interacting with the guys in your barracks only. After basic we were both assigned to the same career field, Navigation and Radar Repair and consequently were both shipped out to Keesler AFB in Biloxi, Mississippi for training. When I arrived all the training classes were full and my enrollment was delayed by a few weeks. Larry had arrived earlier and was assigned to a class right away. Keesler was the first place I remember seeing Larry. We knew who each other was at that point but we were not yet friends.

There were 3 shifts of 5 or 6 hour training classes, A shift (morning), B shift, (afternoon), and C shift (evening). When we were not in class we were assigned to various details (tasks) for another three to four hours. Somehow I qualified for the accelerated program which meant I was assigned to B shift. Larry managed to get himself assigned to C shift. (I should mention that while I was in the Air Force I tested at the top/genius level on their tests. Unfortunately it didn't last as once I got out I suddenly returned to being only slightly above average, just like I had prior to joining.) Being on B shift I was assigned work details in the morning before class. B shift was the worst shift as it got the most assignments. The task lists were all generated the first thing in the morning so there was always more than enough for us to do. C shift was the best shift as it got the least work details as most of the tasks would have been completed by A and B shifts. They slept all day and as most of the administration was leaving for the day they were just getting up. There was often not much on the “to-do” list for them plus not many staff around to assign and monitor work details. Our career field training course was 42 weeks long. While Larry was 4 weeks ahead of me by the time I started my training, I was actually scheduled to complete my training a couple of weeks before him due to being in the accelerated program. However, I ended up going AWOL for a week and that coupled with a few weeks of punishment pushed me back enough so Larry completed his training first. He was shipped out to Beale AFB in Marysville, CA and two weeks later I was shipped out to the same base.

When I arrived at Beale I knew who Larry was but it was here that we really became friends. We both initially worked day shift but before long we were assigned to work different shifts. Larry lived in the barracks and being married I lived off base so we were now friends but still did not spend a lot of time together. We had a bit in common, both New Yorkers, both liked to make fun of every situation, both irreverent, both did not care for being in the military, and both willing to speak our mind which didn't end up endearing us to our Sergeants.

At Beale we worked on spy planes. In CA those planes largely ran training missions, the real missions were run at other bases and in the case of Beale, that was Kadena AFB in Okinawa. After a year or so at Beale we were shipped over to Okinawa on a 120 day TDY assignment and it's there where Larry and I became great mates. The shop in Okinawa was completely manned by staff from Beale. We all rotated in and out, basically the rotation was 9 to 12 months at Beale followed by 4 months in Okinawa. There were always 7 of us in Okinwara. When we were there we worked 10 hour shifts with one day off a week, each of us had a different day off. There were times when no missions were being run so we'd just hang out, playing cards, reading, and goofing off. Larry and I did all that stuff together. We found a copy of a book written by John Lennon entitled “In His Own Write and A Spaniard in The Works” It's a collection of humorous stories and drawings by John. They are very clever if often a bit bizarre, just the kind of stuff that appealed to both Larry and I. We read and re-read that book sometimes reading to ourselves, sometimes reading it to each other. We got to the point where we almost knew all the lines. All through our friendship of 30 years we would reference lines from that book. Our sense of humor was very similar and given our time in the military and long term friendship we had many shared experiences and numerous little inside jokes and we would use them in our banter. We also had both done “est”, Werner Erhard's self improvement training, so we had that in common as well. It wasn't only our history, we would blend in anything that came along referring to things that happened in the past the past week, or even just earlier in our conversation. Most people got lost and could not keep up. I had more than one person tell me that they liked me and they liked Larry but they didn't like me and Larry.  My second wife, Kathy, was jealous of Larry.  One time I was talking with one of Larry's roommates while waiting for Larry.  She had only been around me when I was with Larry.  She had previously made it clear she that didn't care much for me.  Larry was tied up with something so we  chatted for a few  minutes.  At the end of our conversation she said in a rather surprised manner, “Gee Dave, you're actually an OK guy”.

Larry and I would frequently make fun of ourselves but we mostly did whatever came to mind to entertain ourselves with little regard to others who might be around us. One time when Larry was visiting me up in Oregon a telephone guy came to the house to set up phone service. We were just getting one line but it was a large house, it had 3 floors and at least 5 bedrooms. It had phone jacks all over the house. When the telephone guy arrived the he asked us if there were multiple jacks in the house and where they were. We took off in different directions with the intent to help. Each time we found one we'd call out to him and he'd come running. We had him running back and forth between us. He eventually asked which room we wanted the phone in and of course it was the main room where we started out. He finally activated the new line and then told us the phone number in the usual 3-4 cadence everyone uses when reciting a phone number. Larry repeated it back to him in a different cadence. The telephone guy's reply was “No, it's” and then he'd repeat the same number in the usual cadence again. You can't give Larry and I an opening like that so right on cue I said “Oh” and repeated the number in yet a different cadence. Again the guy said no and repeated it his way. Larry then tried yet another different cadence and I don't remember how long this went on but it wasn't long before the guy looked at the both of us and said he needed to get something out of his truck and left. Larry and I broke up. We went to the window to see what he was doing. He was just sitting there doing nothing. He sat there for at least 15 minutes and then he slowly walked back to the house. He came back into the house and gave us a piece of paper with the new phone number written on it, had me sign something, and left. When my roommates came home they asked about the phone and Larry told them the number and of course I said no it's, and repeated the number with a different cadence and then he said “No Dave”, and repeated it in another new cadence. My roommates just rolled their eyes. That's an example of Larry and I at our worst or best depending on how it hits you and of course that became yet another thing we could use in our banter. Most of the women I went out with would get lost when Larry and I started riffing together. However, my wife Kris was one of the few who could keep up with us and even sometimes join in. My father had told me she was a keeper and he was right!

Larry and I also liked to poke fun at stuff by acting out in a role we objected to. Like acting like a warmonger, a misogynist, a red-neck, or even a racist. There was nothing off limits for us. This didn't always work out so well. I remember one time I was at a party at Larry's and I walked into the kitchen to get something off the stove. Behind me were a few people discussing women's rights. Without looking around, I went into “Dave and Larry” mode. I blurted out “All the blather about women's rights was a bunch of hooey. Everybody knows that a woman's place is in the kitchen.” The room went silent. I turned around. Larry was not in the room and no one in there knew who I was. What could I do? I just walked out and left them with stunned looks on their faces. Larry should have been there, he would have loved it.

I experienced my first earthquake with Larry. We were smoking a doobie in his apartment when it happened. We both stopped and looked at each other. Neither of us said anything. I was not too sure what was happening. Then his roommate ran down the hall to where we were and asked “Did you feel that? It 's an earthquake! You guys should get in a door jam.” Instead of concern I felt relief as I was thinking there was either something wrong with me or with the doobie we were smoking. We just laid on the floor laughing...

Larry and Mark in my old SF apartment

Larry is the only friend of mine who knew all three of my wives, not to mention all my girl friends. We did a ton of stuff together through the years. After Kris and I moved to Sacramento we did not get too many chances to visit with each other. I was working a lot of hours here and he was still in SF. I was about to turn 50 and I was planning to have a party. Becoming 50 prompted me to look back on my life and I realized that due to moving around so much I had lost contact with almost all of my friends. The exceptions were my friends Mark and Larry. I thought about it and realized a major reason for that was they were good at keeping in touch with people, something I was not good at. I hadn't seen Larry for over a year when I phoned him one day. He had been battling some sort of stomach cancer. I called him hoping he could attend my party. I started to tell him about my “revelation” and started to tell him how much I appreciated him. Larry never liked sentimentality. In the middle of it we were disconnected. Larry was in the midst of getting chemotherapy treatments and he was feeling poorly. I tried calling back but got no answer. I figured he was just too sick at that point to talk. I called a few days later and Larry said he couldn't talk and was in the middle of something. Not unusual, but that was the last time I spoke to him. I don't know if I inadvertently offended him or what but the next time I tried calling his phone was disconnected. I later heard he moved out of the city but did not know where. A few years ago I talked to someone who knew Larry and they said as far as they knew he was OK but they had also lost contact with him awhile back. I miss him....