On June 23, 2021, a good friend of mine passed away. I met Duncan 40 years ago. I was just 14 and going steady with his best friend, Chris. The three of us hung out together for many, many years as Chris and I eventually married. Duncan was our best man at the wedding.
Duncan was a dreamer. He has such big ideas and he didn’t care how lofty they were. He was also a very talented musician who played guitar (he taught me a lot over the years) and taught himself how to play the mandolin and later, the bagpipes. He became a permanent fixture in our home, spending weekends with us when he was going to college. We spent many summer afternoons on a little boat in the middle of Lake St. Clair, the three of us, either fishing, resting or swimming.
The weekends at our house didn’t change when girlfriends came in and out of his life. He’d just bring them along. And when he found the one he wanted to marry, we stood up in their wedding. A year later, we bought houses in Chatham two blocks from each other, and we spent many evenings and weekends together. Duncan was always in a good mood and you could count on him to bring the fun.
He and his first wife separated a couple of years before Chris and I did. And once Chris and I separated, I didn’t see so much of Duncan anymore. But he went on to marry again, became community minded, played bagpipes for the Legion, and with his then wife Chelle, they ran Operation Red Nose at Christmas time and together they brought Gregor’s Crossing, a medieval faire, to Chatham.
I reconnected with Duncan on Facebook a few years back, but he wasn’t there much. I still considered him a good friend even after all the years apart. We had practically grown up together and then raised our respective families together for a lot of years. It saddens me that he is no longer here after he was such a permanent fixture in my life for much of the past 40 years.
I couldn’t sleep the night of the day of his passing. In the wee hours of the morning, I wrote this little poem. It’s not particularly good, but does sum up our friendship rather concisely.
Three
It all began 40 years ago
I went steady with your best friend
I was barely fourteen…so young we were then!
For years there was you and he but now
You and he and me made three
Saturday night stock car races
Dances at the school
Afternoons, music and bologna sandwiches
And bonding over playing guitar
All through those high school years
He and you and me made three
To different cities you both left for college
I stayed behind and worked
Soon came the day you were our best man
And he and me and you made three
We were still young and life was fun
Every weekend you were there
Laughing, drinking, playing guitars and singing
Saturday afternoons out on the lake
Fishing, swimming and relaxing, so carefree
Then he and me and baby made three
You found a wife, she joined our lives
We bought a house, you bought one two streets away
We had more kids, and you did, too
So there was he and me and you and she
Living with our broods of three
Life sure got busy…
Some good things come to an end
Like he and me and you and she
I got the kids and you got yours
In the course of our divorces
Then again, like it was so long ago
There was you and he without me
I never forgot our happy times
Or the friend you were to me
On Facebook we would keep in touch
Though you I’d rarely see
So I was shocked and saddened when he called
To say you’d passed away…
My thoughts have turned to olden days
When we were all growing up together
And all life’s storms we’d weathered
And how I miss your music
And that crooked, silly grin
I wish I could have said goodbye
To you, my dreamer friend
But I’ll see you on the other side
When it should become my time
And we’ll reminisce of years gone by
When you and me and he made three
Rest in Paradise, Duncan
