Why does it take a death? Why does it take a take a death for lifelong friends to finally get together and reunite? When I went to bed Sunday night, I had no idea that I would awake Monday morning to read the obituary of a longtime friend in the online edition of the Lubbock Avalanche Journal. The news of his death traveled among mutual friends quickly. Phone calls ensued. Little did I know when the day ended Sunday that I would be on the road to Post, Texas at 5:00 in the morning Tuesday? The memorial service for Danny was scheduled to start 10:00 a.m. It is a long and somewhat lonely trek to Post. After I turned off IH-20 at Roscoe and started down US 84 toward Snyder memories from 1978 start flooding through my head.

You see Danny was my first “boss.” He managed the full service car wash where I worked with several close friends during my high school years. It was hard work indeed. But we loved it. I learned a lot about meeting people and dealing with the public. It helped me to overcome a shy side of my personality. Danny took us on fishing trips. He hosted barbeques for us at his home. When I was a senior in high school, I was kicked off the debate team for disciplinary reasons. I ended up graduating a quarter early, so the car wash job became fulltime overnight. There are a lot of memories during that impressionable time of my life.

When I started to college at Texas Tech in 1980, I decided I needed a better job. I moved on to something else that gave more opportunity to learn and grow as a person. I continued to stay in contact with most of my friends from the car wash during the college years. But we all moved on. Several of them stayed in Lubbock. The rest of us decided to leave after finishing undergraduate studies. The years flew by and we lost contact with one another.

Last summer Danny called me out of the blue when I was on my way home from a meeting at DPS Region I Headquarters in Garland. We had not talked in over 26 years. That conversation did not end until I pulled in the driveway in Granbury an hour and a half after the call started! I promised to come see him in Lubbock soon. It proved to be the last conversation I would ever have with my friend, Danny.

Three of us reunited at Danny’s memorial service Tuesday morning. We are a little older and a little grayer! And I think we are a little wiser too. One of the guys pointed out that his parents were in the process of divorcing during our car wash years. Another friend and car wash employee was struck by a car and incurred some permanent disabilities. He too was at the memorial service. Still another fellow employee, who is our age, watched his father go to prison during that time period. And I was dealing with the sudden death of my father in 1978…

As chatted during our lunch with Danny’s family in the basement of the Methodist church, the crisis events each of us were experiencing during 1978 and 1979 become a focal point of the conversation. We decided that we were fortunate to have each other during those crucial and difficult years.

As we looked at Danny’s wife interacting with family members, we realized it is our turn to serve her now. She knows she has three adopted sons named Pat, Randy, and John. We will take good care of her. But I think she must wonder in the back of her mind if we have really grown up or not!

I am glad I went to the service Tuesday morning. It was great to see Danny‘s wife and all of his family. Their daughter was 5 years old in 1978. It does not seem real to me that she is an adult with children of her own! As I headed back South on US 84 Tuesday afternoon, I could not help but wonder why it takes a death for us to reunite.