Best Friends (dedicated to Dexter, Sandy, Tim and Tony)
We’ve all probably had different best friends at various points in our lives.
My first best friend was Dexter Miller.
I met Dexter in 1969 on the day we moved to 193
rd street in St. Albans,
Queens.
While my dad was unloading the moving van, Dexter had introduced himself, brought a couple of “the boys” over and introduced them, and had us drag-racing down the driveway even before I had entered our new home.
Dexter and I were like Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer; we dedicated our time together to being adventurous young men.
We invented crazy games; thought up new and exciting things to do with dirt; and ran up and down the block all day long.
When we were tired of causing trouble on our block, we would venture onto other blocks to cause trouble.
There were a couple of other boys in our crew – Junior and Michael, and sometimes Ronnie and David Shepherd – but Dexter and I were the core.
“Me and Dexter” would go to the candy store, buy a couple of armloads of penny candy, and bring the candy back onto our block and sell it for a nickel a piece. We would then go back to the candy store and spend our profits on more candy and chips, and hole up at his house or in the “house tree” and proceed to eat it all. I only got sick once, and I never missed or skipped any meals at home. We played basketball, football, baseball, ringo levio, red-light-green-light-one-two-three, tag, and (in our later years) R-C-K (Run, Catch and Kiss). Sometimes our baseball games degenerated into beanball wars, and sometimes our basketball games became hacking contests. For some reason, this never happened when we played football. To this day, I proudly bear a couple of permanent scars from our sporting activities; best friend’s loyalty kept me from telling my mom where the wounds came from. Once in a while we would have disagreements and be mad at each other for maybe half a day or so, but Dexter would always make sure that the “mad” didn’t last too long.
We spent lots of time in each other’s homes playing more games and watching lots of television. Dexter loved to watch westerns, but I wasn’t really excited about them. We both loved the Stooges, Abbott and Costello, and most especially Slip Mahoney and the Bowery Boys. We couldn’t get enough of their antics. To this day, “routine four” means Dexter turns off the lights and I hit the deck and cover my head!
Dexter had an older brother and an older sister (Connie and Bubba), who were about the same ages as my older brother and sister (Adrienne and Owen).
We even each had our own dog – although we had
Sandy for 13 years, while Dexter’s pets had woefully short life spans.
It’s not that he didn’t take care of his pets; he just wore the damn things out one after the other.
The Millers’ basement was one of the hotspots on the block; it was a grown-ups’ entertainment center that the grown-ups never got to use.
There was always television and good soul music, either on the stereo or live (Bubba had his own band).
There was a pool table that got plenty of use until it was converted into a table for train sets (HO gauge) and racing tracks (AFX, as I recall) which would run at the same time.
And if that wasn’t enough to keep us occupied, the kitchen was right up the steps, as was Dexter’s backyard and the great outdoors.
A couple of “firsts” happened in that basement:
I had my first beer (I was 10 or 11), and had my first hit of weed (I was about 12).
I loved the taste of beer the moment it crossed my lips.
I swear that my first hits of marijuana had no effect, but the next day Dexter and Bubba were laughing at me when they saw me; they told me that it took me about three minutes to make the 150-foot walk from their house to my house the previous night, and that my path was about as straight as a housefly’s flight path.
Fun with Dexter continued until his family moved away.
The first move was to Hollis,
Queens, a two- or three-mile bike ride away.
The Millers didn’t visit much after they moved, so I would ride my bike over there all the time.
I was, of course, welcome as always and Dexter and I still had fun, but it just wasn’t the same – partly because we were older and partly because we each developed other interests, but mostly because we weren’t hanging on 193
rd Street any more.
The Millers only stayed in Hollis a couple of years before moving down south to North or South Carolina (I don’t remember which, but I’m sure my sister Adrienne does).
I remember my last visit to Hollis:
when I arrived at Dexter’s house, I crashed my bike by riding into a huge hole that his latest mutt had dug in the backyard.
The hole was so big that I still can’t believe I didn’t see the thing.
Anyway, I dusted myself off and we had our visit.
In the living room was something I had never seen before:
two turntables and a thing called a “mixer”.
Dexter said that he and Bubba were deejays now.
With Dexter was a tall, light-skinned brother with big, coke-bottle glasses on; his name was Darryl.
I don’t remember Darryl saying anything much, and I never saw him or Dexter again after that visit.
Years later, rap music would make its mark on the American cultural scene.
One of the first rap groups to go mainstream in
America was Run-DMC.
The “DMC” in Run-DMC was Darryl McDaniels, the tall, bespectacled young man in Dexter’s living room the last time I saw him.
I heard from Dexter one last time in 1999 after I had moved to
Washington, DC.
Somehow Dexter obtained my phone number from my sister.
He called me, and tried to get me to guess who was on the other end of the phone.
I had no idea who it was until he told me.
Dexter always had a bass voice (whereas I was always more of an alto), but his voice had deepened by about three octaves.
He sounded more like Barry White than the Dexter I knew.
He was all grown up like I was and was living down in Triangle,
Virginia.
Dexter was very proud of his daughter, who had just graduated from college with honors.
He was all settled down and was trying to find work as a heavy equipment operator.
We chewed the fat for a bit, exchanged numbers, and promised to keep in touch.
Some time later I tried to call him to arrange a visit, but the number was no longer in use.
I think that my sister still keeps in touch with Connie, so if Dexter is still alive we may yet meet again.
It will be way cool, but it won’t be the same.
We’ll have some nice stories to swap, and I’m sure his will be better.
That’s just how Dexter was.
For a time there, my dog
Sandy was my best friend.
For various reasons which all fall under the heading “change”, I spent a good chunk of my early teens alone in the house with
Sandy.
When my mom decided it was time to put
Sandy to sleep, I could not muster the spirit to walk with the two of them to the vet.
Sandy was one of those dogs who “got it”.
If you wanted him to leave you alone, all you had to say were the words "take a bath".
He would instantly disappear – and it’s tough for a 110-pound dog to disappear in a one-family house!
I knew that he would know something was up if both Mom and I walked him on the different, much longer route to the veterinary clinic, and I couldn’t face him giving me that look that I just knew was coming.
Those of you who regularly read my stuff know that I have already written my one and only "
Sandy story".
I’m sticking to my word.
Sandy is the one best friend that I still think about almost every day.
Tim Jameison was my best friend after Dexter.
Tim and I attended the same Catholic grammar school (St. Catherine of
Siena), and became fast friends when we were both Patrol Boys.
Patrol Boys patrolled the school exits and monitored the comings and goings of students during recess and before and after school.
Some of it was legitimate, but I definitely remember that a lot of it was a crock.
The girls used to see if they could “cute” their way past us to use the bathroom, and of course they did.
The guys knew not to try that crap.
On rare occasions one of us would have to take a beating from one of the older guys for doing our job.
At some point, free candy must have been involved, because we all loved the job!
Most of the Patrol Boys were also Cub Scouts who became Webelos who became Boy Scouts.
One of my childhood highlights was attending a Boy Scout meeting after blowing them off for about six months so I could watch TV on Friday nights.
During that meeting, I was elected troop leader.
True to my style, I never attended another meeting.
To the best of my recollection, this is about the time Tim and I started hanging out big-time.
I would probably still not be on speaking terms with that blockhead friend’o’mine if not for Facebook! I saw his mug looking back at me on my Facebook “wall” one evening and decided it was time to grow up a little and make the friend request. Fortunately, he had grown up a little as well and accepted. He’s still a big blockhead, though! Hee hee hee! I know he’s reading this too! Whassup, buddy! Give me a freaking lift next time!
Tim and I wasted hundreds of hours doing dumb shit (sorry Mom) after school and on breaks from school:
watching TV, eating junk food, watching more TV, raiding his refrigerator, eating 15-cent ice cream sandwiches, having dinner courtesy of his dad, practicing submission holds on each other (I did most of the practicing – well,
all of it), and walking about two miles each way on summer nights from his house to the Carvel ice cream stand “over the line” in Elmont, Long Island (banana! Pistachio! Black and white Flying Saucers!).
Later on in our friendship, Tim and I still found time to hang out even though we went to different high schools.
We would hang out in the park with our 40s and wacky weed.
Once, I swear we caught LL Cool J freestyling at that little park where Merrick Boulevard, 120
th Avenue and Baisley Boulevard all intersect – it’s the corner of what later became
Roy Wilkins Park.
They had their pro deejay equipment illegally connected to a light pole to draw enough power to rock the mike – it was very ingenious.
For some reason, the police didn’t break it up for a good while.
Then there was the night we broke into St. Catherine’s just because we could.
It wasn’t our fault – they left the window and window gate unlocked.
We didn’t do any damage, but my erstwhile buddy, in a burst of inspiration, wrote a list of all of his teachers from first grade though eighth grade on the first grade classroom blackboard.
We also did the unthinkable:
we checked out the girls’ bathroom, just so we could finally cross that off our “to-do” lists.
We hung tough until college sent us our separate ways – Tim to
Massachusetts and me to
Connecticut.
In between hanging with Tim and the seniors at
Regis High School, I somehow accumulated enough credits to graduate with my class.
Seriously, though, I blew off studying with a complete vengeance!
Three and a half years of studying 3-4 hours a night every night made me a tad rambunctious….
I have to give a quick shout-out to Mark Robertson, my best friend at
Yale University.
We were best friends for convenience’s sake, to be honest about it.
I absolutely have to mention Mark because he showed me that it was possible to dig “white stuff”
and be accepted by the “brothers and sisters”.
If there’s such a thing as rowdy, uncontrollable Yalies, that was us.
Here’s to “Mark and Dave”.
And then there’s Tony.
Tony Sankitts was my best friend at
Regis High School, a tuition-free, all-male Jesuit college preparatory school on
Manhattan’s Upper East-Side.
We pretty much hit it off the first week, if not the first day, and were in the same homeroom through all four years.
Tony was a feisty
vato from Uniondale,
Long Island, which meant that we both rode the “F” train together on the way home from school.
Sometimes we would stop at the pizza joint on the corner of
Lexington and East 86
th Street before heading down into the subway.
We each would get a plain slice and a small drink.
Tony went heavy on the red chili flakes; I went for the garlic powder.
On rare occasions I would get a Sicilian slice.
The Sicilian slices cost a few nickels more, but were more filling, definitely more of a comfort food.
They had to be heated up because they sat around for a bit.
The regular slices, on the other hand, generally came right out of the oven piping-hot.
I remember folding that piping-hot slice “Noo Yawk style” (folded in the middle), watching the grease pool in the center, watching the tip of the slice flop down like a dog’s ear, and finally taking that first bite.
We tried to wait until it cooled enough, but who could wait that long?
Second-degree burns be damned!
Tony had a lush head of wavy brown hair, and he was always brushing it back with his hand. He was concerned about premature baldness for some reason (his dad and brother Ulysses both had big Afros); I seized on this and told him that brushing his hair back would hasten his hair loss. This, of course, made him worry even more about brushing his hair back, which made him brush it back even more. It was wonderful!
Sports bound us together. Tony was one of the best ping-pong players in the school. He played equally well using an American grip or a “Chinese” inverted grip I still don’t understand how to counter-act that crazy reverse spin he would put on the ball at times; and even if I did return the ball, it would be a very, very weak return, the kind where the only question was which armpit of mine he was going to stick the ball in when he returned it. Thanks to him, I improved to the point where I would play him tough most games and actually beat him about once every ten games. We were natural teammates on the basketball court, him with his ball-handling skills and good outside shot, and me with my all-around skills and no-nonsense inside game. It felt good knowing that I could put a little extra “oomph” on a leading bounce pass because I knew that Tony would run right through the ball, and then look for me cutting straight to the basket. Yeah.
We were also bound by our situation. As “brainy” minorities, we didn’t really fit in anywhere except with our families and each other. We were looked at as curiosities to a certain extent everywhere we went, so our banding together became a natural thing.
I used to ride my ten-speed from St. Albans, Queens to Uniondale,
Long Island to hang with Tony during the summer months.
The ride took about 45 minutes if I hustled, which I always did.
Once there, we rode around, played basketball and softball, and ate a lot.
Tony’s mom was an absolutely fantastic cook.
She cooked all-American favorites like pancakes and sausage, meatloaf, fried chicken, and cheeseburgers and fries, and also cooked authentic Puerto Rican dishes like
pasteles (meat pies), plantains and
paella. Nothing beats homemade
pasteles!
The Sankitts family moved to
Queens Village somewhere in there; I had mixed emotions about their move.
On the one hand, the bike ride was a good half-hour shorter now.
On the other hand, Tony was the only guy I knew who lived in an area where they didn’t have to lock their doors at night.
Out in
Uniondale, I used to marvel at the fact that the kids just left their bikes laying in their driveways or on their front lawns.
Man, I had my ten-speed locked in my garage, and it
still got stolen!
Tony and I were seniors during the “disco wars” of 1979. I hated that struggle because I was stuck in the middle … not. I had to have my boy Tony’s back because we were minorities in a mostly white environment, but I had no problems listening to rock and roll and most of my best friends were white. Both sides thought the idea of taking turns playing music was ludicrous. So I did the only thing that I thought was fair – I stayed neutral. Sometimes I wonder what might have happed in the senior section of the cafeteria if I weren’t there. It probably would have been bad for Tony.
The last time I saw Tony was sometime around 1992.
I decided to look him up one day and caught up with him at one of the Sam Ash music stores on 48
th Street in
Manhattan.
At the time, Tony was a professional deejay.
(He got some good airtime on WKTU-FM courtesy of DJ Red Alert.)
We hung out that evening until the wee hours of the morning, and he dropped me off at my home in Hempstead,
Long Island, ending an outing that included a stop at Fool’s Paradise, a strip club in The Bronx.
Just as Tony pulled off, he shouted “Don’t be a Fool!”
That was a good night.
A couple of years ago, it occurred to me that I hadn’t heard from or been contacted by Tony in a while, so I looked him up.
My search took me to Regis’ alumni web page, where I discovered that he was deceased.
I was numbed by the news.
Tony was the first good friend of mine to pass away, and at that point I hadn’t really had that many people who were close to me pass away.
All I could find out was that he died young, and in his sleep.
He was survived by a wife and child.
The worst part is that I didn’t know for years, and as a result could not attend the services or show my respect in any way, shape of form other than prayer.
I tried to track down his family on one visit to
New York City a few years ago, but was not successful.
I vow to find his mom, wife and/or brother on my next visit, and will convey my condolences and let them know how much Tony is missed, not only by me but also by my Regis Class of 1979 schoolmates.
One similarity that I have noticed with my “core four” best friends is that I remember the last time I saw each one of them. Not for nothing, but I don’t remember the last time I saw Mark. He grew up in the DC metro area, so he could be living next door for all I know. That would be pretty cool … but I made the decision not to look for him a long time ago. If we ever do meet again, I will certainly cherish the moment. Good friends are hard to come by, and harder to keep.
