Anniversary

Tomorrow would be our 37th anniversary.  Here we are at Crater Lake with Don & Don of Portland & Medford in about 1995.  Several years later we were driving from Seattle back to San Diego.  At Eugene we had the choice of going I5 and hauling ass back to San Diego or taking the scenic highway through the Crater Lake area and Charlie very fortunately wanted to do the Crater Lake highway.  They let you hike down to the lake, it was awesome, incredible, it really is astoundingly beautiful.  We got a motel in Medford then continued back home.  From the top of the mountain you can see hundreds of miles, the elevation must be over 8000 feet, you can see the big Cascade volcanos from California all the way to Washington State, a huge sweep of territory and beautiful forests.  On the highway out of Eugene Charlie was having a little trouble, the quickly alternating shadows and bright from trees along the highway gave him a migraine, I always wondered if that might have been an early symptom of his disease.  But he handled the walk down and up the crater to the lake just fine.  He was driving a lot less by then, I think he was aware that his driving was not up to par.

On that topic, I remember a time when we were at a friend's house and I had had a bit too much to drink so didn't want to drive, I asked him to and it was a wild ride.  At one intersection when he got his green light he went into the wrong lane and got honked at, it was a serious mistake, then on the freeway he would alternate between way too fast and way too slow, and on an onramp he was speeding scarily. It broke his heart and infuriated him when the DMV took away his license but thank God they did, seeing how badly he drove that time coming home from the friend's house was alarming, he had been driving all over town, using the freeways, going to & from meetings so I am glad he never got into an accident.

So anyway, it would have been 37 years tomorrow.  We met at a party thrown by a friend of his from high school, who had been a partner of mine for several months.  We did not fall in love right away.  It took a while.  We just hung out, got comfortable with each other, he had a great sense of humor, really a dry sophisticated wit, ironic, I appreciated that very much.  I also appreciated his politics.  We did not disagree on much and when we did I had to admit he was usually right.  He once turned down a date offered by a rich Republican who had offered to fly him off to a vacation in Tahiti or some wonderful exotic place like that but Charlie would never have anything to do with Republicans.  And I had been a Republican as a kid.  My family were Eisenhower Republicans, the party wasn't always crazy, there were some good Republicans back then.  But Nixon made a Democrat of me and I have never regretted the change, the Republicans are just too crazy now, denying climate change, wanton obstructionism, etc.  Charlie would have LOVED this last election season, the total comedy of the Republican primary season followed by what really was the best election I have ever seen, Democrats winning big top to bottom and so much of it because the Republicans were just being such total a. holes, showing themselves for what they really are.  Politics were always important to us.  We walked precincts together, that was our first date, in fact.  Charlie was always much more political than I.  Neither of us could ever understand how mixed party couples could exist, its such a huge philosophical divide.

What do I miss most about him.  Just the company.  Just talking with him.  Our afternoon walks.  For decades we took walks usually down to the pier and back, sometimes out to Sunset Cliffs, just talking, often about politics, how horrible the Republicans were or of course gay topics as you'd expect.  I miss cuddling, wrapping him up between my thighs and in my arms, putting my head on that beautiful chest (best chest ever, even when he was ill) and listening to his heart beating.  Just simple things, watching TV together.  Those interminable drives up to and back from Oakland to visit Steve & Pat.  It seems like just yesterday that we met.  All the other guys at the party split to go to the gay bar, we stayed around and chatted.  Next day after walking the precinct for Kapiloff we went to the beach, I remember it as a hot and sunny day, we were at Pescadero St. beach, there was sand on it then, that all washed away after a storm in 1982 and never came back.  1982 Charlie had a melanoma diagnosed on the back of his leg, a level 4, his first doctor gave him only a 50-50 chance of surviving, how scary that was.  But they did biopsy on lymph nodes that showed no spread so the doctor raised Charlie's chances to 95%, he had two other melanomas but they were caught extremely early and posed no danger.  Our friend Sandy had melanoma also in 1982, we all resolved to celebrate with a trip to Hawai'i if the 5 year safety period was reached, it was, and we did, and then with Sandy we met up in Montreal and partied big time there and down the coast of Maine on another trip.

I love you Charlie.  I hope I get to see you on the other side, whenever that comes.  Love, Bob