Sometimes Things Go Around In Circles

I am in a couple of connections websites--plaxo & linkedin.  Through one of these sites, I connected with an old friend, Richard McKeown, with whom I have corresponded off and on for the past 35 years or so.  We were neighbors and friends in St Albans, Vermont, in the 1960s.  Had the same teachers, played on the same Little League team [old flannel uniforms dating from the 1950s that were hotter than blazes], slid down the same hills [including through his backyard], I substituted for his paper route and for his brother's when they went on vacation, we traded baseball cards [Willie Kirkland of the Senators was our favorite], went to Lester's for popsicles, laughed our heads off at Dennis the Menace books, and so forth.

I heard from Richard today and wondered about a mutual friend, David Rakowski, who would have turned 50 on Friday the 13th.  David was born on a Friday the 13th.  The last time I saw him was at his father's funeral in 1979 in St Albans.  Ironically, I had moved away from St Albans in 1973 and returned there  after graduating from the University of Maine in 1979.  I ended up living on the same street that David & I grew up on.  I always had heard David had done well with his music--he used to compose and re-arrange music for the BFA band in HS.  David, a year younger than me, had left St Albans and never come back.  [His brother lived in the next town, so I assume he came to visit once in awhile].

Richard let me know about David's website so I found out that he was still alive.  I spent many days and nights at David's playing basketball & baseball, reading the myriads of comic books [sans covers] that his dad procured from the paper mill in Sheldon, having milk bone fights [milkweed pods, if you want to get technical], collecting monarch caterpillars [somewhat related to the milk bone fights--we were easliy distracted], trading Batman cards, climbing trees and listening to Monkees albums. 

David's wife teaches music at the University of Maine--clarinet to be specific.  My wife, a music major at the Crane School of Music in Potsdam NY, was a clarinet player is HS, and she let someone from the local HS borrow her old clarinet for band one year.  That student went on to go to the University of Maine to study music.  So, I suppose, David's wife was her instructor--my wife had instructed her as well.  David teaches at Brandeis just outside of Boston, but they own a home in Bangor, too. 

My nephew attends the University of Maine, which is 10 miles north of Bangor.  Bangor is where the HS basketball tournament for Eastern Maine is held.  I played there as a senior at Woodland HS and I attended many times while in college.  I went to see our rivals--Calais Memorial HS--play and watched Schenck High School play in the opener.  One kid had bright red hair.  That kid is my nephew's father.  Who happens to have the same birth date as me.

There are other connections in this circle that I have not mentioned.  But it is pretty amazing how sometimes these things go around in circles.

Comments

[Jeff Gwynne]

Paul-

I love this story. It reads like Stephen King's "The Body" without the horror. (How's that for a circular connection?)

While many have disagreed with me, I think electronic media (starting with e-mail) has changed communications *more* than the telephone.

-Jeff