Buffalo 86

Larry & me in his Buffalo State dorm room-there's vodka in my cup

    Recently an old friend of mine, Larry, passed away on Oct 15th. I met him when I was 8 years old and we became best friends soon after, right up through the end of high school and throughout our 20’s thru our 50’s. Of course we did different things throughout our lives and could go several months without talking, especially when I moved to Seattle in 2003 from NYC, where we grew up. After that, I visited NYC two times and he visited me in Seattle once. When we did talk, we’d be on the phone for at least 2 hours. The last time we talked was on his birthday last year, just before I left for my European adventure. The last contact with Larry was in May with other friends in a group chat about our exploits with the Brooklyn-Mobile years ago (that’s a story for another time). The last text he sent me was to wish me a Happy Birthday in September. I’m still processing he's passing, but it definitely doesn’t seem real. I’m sure it has something to do with the fact that we were thousands of miles apart and didn’t see each other a lot. In fact the last time I saw him in person was in 2008 when I visited NYC. Had I still lived in NYC, we would have gotten together on a regular basis and his absence would probably be felt much more than it is now. But as we do when our loved ones pass away, we celebrate them and remember them by telling stories. There is a story I’d like to tell about the photo at the top of this blog.
    It was January 1986. Larry and I were both in college. I stayed in Brooklyn and went to Brooklyn College and did as horrible as one could do in a semester of college. The very minimal effort I put in high school just didn’t cut it for the college work load. I just stopped going to all the classes. I didn’t even properly withdraw. Larry ended up going to Buffalo State University. So he was home on Christmas break and instead of taking the train back for the spring semester, we came up with the idea that I would drive Larry the 400 miles to Buff State and hang out there for a few days before I had to return to Brooklyn college for the beginning of my spring semester. I did better than the fall semester but not much. Now the car we’d be taking was a 1976 Chrysler Cordoba. It had bucket seats, an 8-track tape player and that rich corinthian leather that Ricardo Montalbán told us about. The car had been gifted to me and my brother by my uncle. There were a few problems though. The car was unregistered, uninsured and I only had a learner’s permit. And there were also concerns that this gas guzzling car wouldn’t make the trek. These issues did not stop us from going on this journey. I remember pulling up to a gas station in Brooklyn, filling it up and the shuffling off to Buffalo. I just said to myself-do not speed and get stopped by a state trooper for that would be the end. We ended up making it to Buffalo without incident and thus began the lost weekend.
    There was already a ton of snow on the ground when we arrived. I found a space in a parking lot close to Larry’s residence hall. I believe there was still a full week before the semester started so not all the students were back yet. We went to Larry’s dorm room. His room mate was there, which meant I would be sleeping on the cold dorm room floor. He introduced me to some friends and then we immediately started drinking; Dixie Bell Vodka from a plastic bottle. The very bottle Larry is holding in his hand in the photo. It was too cold to go out, so we just hung out in different friend's dorm rooms. Now of course you are not allowed to drink in the rooms, as the drinking age is 21 and we’re all 18. You also can't smoke in there either, cigarettes or weed. To mask any possibility of getting caught, towels were rolled up and put at the bottom of the door and the windows open. Some even burned incense in case a nosy RA wanted to come into the room. I got blackout drunk, so there’s no doubt I acted like a fool. I was also dared to eat extra hot Buffalo wings. They were too hot and I only had Dixie Bell vodka to wash it down. The was pretty much how I spent the few days I was there. Passing out on the floor, waking up with a terrible hangover with a burned tongue and lips and then just doing it all over again. That was what I did the three days I was there. I believe there was also a gravity bong involved one of the nights. It’s really all a blur. However there was just one problem, the old Cordoba got towed.
    This was on the second day there. We were going to go somewhere. At first, my reaction was that someone stole it. One of Larry’s friends suggested we check with public safety. Sure enough, they towed the car. The reason they towed it was because it was a public hazard. When I arrived, I parked in the first spot as soon as you entered the lot. The problem was that there was too much snow in the front part of the space, which meant my back-end was sticking out over the entrance. In order to get the car out of campus jail, you had to show your license and pay a fine. As I’ve mentioned, I didn’t have a proper license. One of Larry’s friends was going to show his license but it had to match the registration, which makes sense since any old schmuck would be able to pay the towing fee and claim it was their car. For some reason they didn’t seem to notice or care that the registration had expired. The even bigger problem though was that I didn’t have the money to even pay the fine. So the only thing I could do was drink more vodka and drown my sorrows. The next day however, in just a slight moment of sobriety, the only way out of this is to call up my Dad and have him wire some money. I thought I’d pay the fine, show the towing guy my permit and just say that Larry’s friend was the driver and hopefully they’d just want to get the stupid car off their lot and agree. But instead my father said that he’d come up to Buffalo and take care of the whole thing. On one level, the problem would be solved but another level, how much shit am I in for? How pissed is he going to be? He took a plane from LaGuardia airport to Buffalo and met me at the towing lot. It turns out he wasn’t made at all. The reason why he wasn't mad was that he was stuck in Valley Stream, NY with his father who was driving him crazy. He jumped at the chance to get the hell out of that house. I could said I'm in Siberia and he would have caught the next plane out. I said goodbye to Larry and his friends and then me and my dad were on our way.
    Along the way, one of the tires blew out. We had to take it to a shop in some small town along I-81 in upstate New York. Could you imagine If this happened if I was on my own? The mechanic was not able to repair that day which meant we now had to get a motel room and dinner at a restaurant and breakfast in the morning. My father probably ended up spending at least $300 for me and Larry’s idea to drive up to Buffalo. But because my grandfather was who he was, my father didn’t bat an eyelash.
    I am happy to say the rest of the trip went fine, though we almost got busted for the unregistered car. We were at a toll booth to some bridge in NYC. My dad paid it and asked the attendant for a receipt. The attendant saw the expired sticker on the windshield and then said, I’ll need to see your registration. My dad just said nevermind and sped off as the attendant shouted, “Hey!” We drove to my uncle's house in Valley Stream where my dad was staying with his dad. My grandfather yelled at me, “Goddamn stupid ass kid!” My dad never once was upset at this incident and never asked to repay him the money he had spent. He would have done anything to get out of that house. Plus it was an opportunity to bond with his son. This was probably the stupidest thing I ever did in my crazy, younger days. It’s good memory I have of my crazy teenage years with not only Larry but my Dad as well, who passed away several years ago in 2018.