Memory can be a re-membering, a putting back together of experiences broken apart by time and neglect, or it can be misused and abused, like rote memorization in high school or compulsive recall that robs you of sleep and dreams. A favorite tale: The Buddhist master and his student come to a stream. They notice a woman about to cross the stream. The master lifts the woman over the stream and sets her down on the other side. The student is confused since he knows that he and his master are not supposed to touch women. As they walk together after crossing the stream, the student asks his master about the prohibition of touching women. The master answers: "Oh, are you still carrying her? I left her back at the stream." When I read Alfonso's post on wine that lives, it began to stir my own memory, as many of his posts do. As I was working my way through a bottle of Neyers Old Lakeville Road Syrah, I remembered my friend Lenny. I then dreamt of him last night. The dream hovered around death, oppression, defiance, righteous indignation. Going way back, Lenny's grandfather, Giovanni (Jewahn phonetic dialect), was a huge man. He owned a small store behind Lenny's home. He sold bread and a few other household items, but the big draw was the loose candy kept in a glass case. With more than a little fear, I used to go there, peer through the case and ask him for some candy. He was a large man with hands half the size of my body, but he was kind and gentle as he handed me the candy. He had a big booming laugh that scared the hell out of me at first. He would give me candy many times for nothing. That was how I met Lenny, his grandson. Lenny was known as "Brother" in his family. Lenny's older brother Johnny was always amused at his younger brother's exploits and chided him a lot. It wasn't until we were teenagers that Lenny and I became friends, meeting at the pizza house in town where there was a good juke box and girls. When we turned 16, it was cars and girls. Lenny had a 55' Chevy just like this.
He tended a parking lot that his father owned and we used to meet up in the tiny booth before we went out for the night. Lenny's father, ostensibly a barber by trade, also ran a house of ill repute bordering the lot, the only house that I knew of in our small New England town. Leonard Sr. was not an admirable father. He was a boaster and spent time in the state pen for God knows what. He used to promote boxing on Misquamicut beach. He once asked my father to take some promotional photos for an upcoming fight. He stiffed him for the money. Leonard Sr. knew Rocky Marciano and his autographed photo was there in his barbershop. He liked big black cars and always wore lots of cologne and rings. So, my friend Lenny knew a little bit more of the world than I at the time. He liked my laugh and so did his saintly mother Gloria, who is still living in the same home to this day. His mother, a very good cook, treated me like another son. We had many good crazy times, lots of laughs. Lenny had more girls on his calendar than I though. My shyness held me back some. He and I loved music. It was doo-wop time, pre-Beatles and Stones. There were songs and there was your, songs like "Since I Don't Have You" by The Skyliners. Since then, the The Flamingos' "I Only Have Eyes For You" seems to have become my song of choice for that time. My mother, my father was too insulated to care, thought Lenny a little too wild for me and nurtured another long friendship which ended when this genuine friend went to Cheshire Academy and learned the fine art of snobbery. In 1965, I went to college and struggled with thermodynamics and quantum mechanics. Lenny went to Vietnam as a Marine and struggled in the rice paddies, zig-zaggin' through ghost land. Lenny was wounded in the same leg that polio had struck when he was very young. He spent a year in the hospital. He was discharged while I was still in college. At the time I was switching majors and thinking of returning to Rhodie Island to finish my degree in whatever at URI. The war was still raging and upheaval was everywhere, especially inside my own confused young head. Lenny and I met up a few times in the late 60's in Westerly and New London. I later learned that he was shooting up and was in bad shape, bottoming out. I met my friend and eventual spouse during these times. She was a light and at the same time she darkened my sense of humor, a valuable art to have in the years since. The next that I heard via relatives was that Lenny had turned it around. Lenny and I shared an aunt who is now in her 90's. He had found someone, married and started a family. He was counselling returning Vietnam vets with employment help. I looked him up a few times when I went to Westerly. He seemed to be doing well. Then it all fell apart. His spouse informed him that she did not find him appealing any longer. They split. Lenny became an avid golfer. He excelled. He went deep sea fishing and generally lived the life of a spurned, but defiant bachelor. His offpsring were sources of great pride and agonizing disappointment. We lost touch for a number of years. We lived our lives and fought our battles. It was my depression that conjoined us up again in the mid 90's. A mutual cousin put us back in touch with each other. Lenny had married again to someone who cared for him and vice versa. He seemed to have regained some of his poise. His anger and resentment had softened some. They had rented a house on a lake in South Kingston, RI. It was secluded and the lake was surrounded by wild rhodendrums. I never got to see them in full bloom in the spring. The house had a small turret in which they had a round table and some chairs. The room was all glass windows that looked out upon that beautiful placid lake. I stayed with them a few times when visiting family or just visiting them senza familia. Attached to the main house was a very rustic Adirondack-style cabin. It was very peaceful and private. Lenny and I used to reminisce and laugh. I used to cook for him sometimes. His spouse did not use garlic and Lenny craved pasta with clams. Then his immune system started to fail and he developed cancer of the throat. He had operations and procedures. Lenny loved to eat and drink wine. The only way he could taste anything was to drink a prescribed chalky liquid that helped him taste food. He wasn't supposed to drink wine, but he would sometimes sip some from my glass. He fought the fight bravely. At one point he admitted to me that he almost commited suicide several times. Then, the unique Lenny within him told him to live it out and see it out, whatever might happen. He seemed to accept his fate. He never did get to collect any retirement checks. He died at home surrounded by friends and family. He was 55. It felt good to reconnect with someone I had known for so many years. I think I brought him some laughs and good memories during his last years. Lenny was generous, direct, curious and compassionate. I met his younger brother, Anthony, a West Point graduate, at his wake. It was like talking to Lenny himself. He was a twin. It was a little freaky. Anthony said to me that Vietnam was what really killed his brother, but you won't find his name among the 58,000+ who were killed in the war. The Marines came in to bid their brother a fine salute. Lenny's older brother Johnny had a seizure as we were talking in the hallway of the funeral home. He fell to the floor. I couldn't hold him up, but I did break his fall. His mother and father in the next room never knew what happened. It was unsettling to say the least, yet something within me remained firm. Johnny had severe drug problems most of his life and died a year later at age 58. Lenny's second wife once told me that pictures flew across the room several times after Lenny passed and maybe still do. Maybe he wasn't really ready to go. Maybe he wanted a few more years. Len, that bottle of Neyers Syrah was one of the best California Syrah's that I have ever had. It had deep elegant backbone. None of that over the top fruit de bomb. It was understated, but firm in the center with a lasting silky finish. I think that you would have enjoyed and savored it too.
