I found out yesterday that my college roommate
died last week. His name was Kenny Cameron. I wish I could have gone to the
funeral, but it was over before I knew about it.
My father was the associate pastor of Tallowood
Baptist Church in Houston in the 1970s. I spent a lot of time at church, as you
can imagine. Two of my closest friends also went to Tallowood - Kenny Cameron
and Mark Carter. Mark sent me an email yesterday and told me about Kenny’s
death. I hadn’t heard from Mark in years either, maybe not since I officiated at
his wedding close to 20 years ago.
Kenny and Mark. Kenny Cameron and Mark Carter.
If I say those names, I can almost feel the 70s. I can feel the heat of Houston;
I can hear the Doobie Brothers; I can feel my stomach fluttering when I tried
talking to a girl. I can remember the church stuff - the youth camps, the
revivals, and youth choir on Sunday nights. The memories are right inside me and
also far behind me. Near and far.
So that you can have a feel for what Kenny
meant to me, I’m going to break a sacred trust I have with myself. I’m going to
tell you the truth about one of the Foy Davis
stories. There are six Foy stories so far. Most of them are
fictional. But one of the stories is true. “Freckles
and Blue” is my best and most faithful recounting of some things
that actually happened to me in middle school. If I close my eyes, I can still
feel the heartbreak of losing “Emma,” but over the years that memory has become
tender. It brings a smile to my face when I remember what a little boy I was and
how deeply I felt the things that wounded me.
Kenny and Mark were on the bus from that story.
I left for camp a stranger, and I came home a week later, having had my first
romance and with Kenny and Mark as my best friends.
That was quite a summer.
Kenny Cameron is dead. I have to keep saying it
because I can’t feel it. Kenny was funny. He laughed a lot and had a killer
smile with perfect white teeth. He was handsome and smooth with girls. I tried
my best to imitate him in this regard, but I was not smooth. Honestly, girls
scared me to death until I was halfway through high school. After that they only
made me nervous, but after being scared to death, nervous feels pretty damn
good. But Kenny was never scared around girls or anything else, or so it seemed
to me at the time. That's how I remember him.
Kenny wanted to be a doctor, and we went off to
Baylor University together, along with “Emma” from the story and a few others
from our church. Kenny and I lived in a tiny dorm room for one year. We hung
everything on our walls upside down, for some reason. We thought it was funny.
Believe it or not, they used to have an organized panty raid for freshmen at
Baylor. The boys would wear their freshmen beanies and sing outside the girls’
dorms. The girls would toss panties out of their windows – specially purchased
for this event, one hopes – with their phone numbers written on them. I have
seen a thousand boys crowded around a tall dormitory and the air filled with
panties. I have seen this. I bear witness to it.
Being very athletic at the time and rather
determined, I snagged 13 pair, which was pretty impressive. We hung
them all on our wall, upside down, and left them there for the entire year. But
I never called a single phone number. You know, that whole nervous around girls
thing.
Yeah, Supertramp playing on Kenny’s 8-track
tape player, drinking Cokes and sitting in our dorm room, surrounded by upside
down posters and panties. Those were the days, right?
But then Kenny joined a fraternity, and I got
very serious about philosophy and my religious studies, so I made the cocky
decision that
fraternities were ridiculous - and I passed up no opportunity to say so. We drifted apart and by the end of college, we
were saying hello if we happened to pass each other on the campus.
Life moved on, as it does. I heard that Kenny
never made it to medical school and that he had a daughter. Then at some point I
heard that he had multiple sclerosis. I never called him. I didn’t know his
number, and his friendship was long gone by then. And I missed his funeral.
That’s the last chapter I have for Kenny, and now that I write it in that way, I
suddenly feel very sad.
Mark Carter lives in Austin now, with his wife
and two daughters. We've agreed that it has been too long. We’re going to meet
soon for Mexican food, cold beer, and about four hours of long overdue
conversation. I’m sorry that it took the death of an old friend to remind us of
how precious these early friendships are, but that’s the way it often happens.
Precious things pass quickly. Life and living
wrap themselves around you and hold you fast to the present. Years fly by, and
you find new friends and new ways of being. But the truth is, new friends are an
infinite possibility, but old friends are fixed in stone. There are only a few
of them, and no more will be added to their ranks. Some will be taken away.
So I’m coming to Austin, Mark. I want to see
what 25 years has done to you and for you. I want to hear about your life. I
want to talk about Kenny and the old days. I’m coming to Austin because there
were only two of you, Kenny and Mark. And now there is only one.
rlp
