One morning, when I was about ten, my mother noticed an electrical outlet sparking in my father’s office. She immediately called 911 and hustled me outside, still in my pajamas and clutching as many as my prized possessions as my slender arms could carry (one box of comic books).
Before the police or the fire department arrived our friend Jim pulled up, ready to do whatever he could to help. A New York City transit cop, Jim heard the call on his scanner and rushed to our house. Over the years he often joked about the sight of me grasping those comics for dear life.
Around the same time Jim arranged one of the greatest surprises of my young life. Using his connections he got me into the Mets bullpen on my tenth birthday. On that day I met Joe Torre, Joe Pignatano and several Mets players. It was and still is the greatest memory of my childhood.
When college beckoned I was faced with the fact that while I had my driver’s license I was still too terrified to drive. Both my parents were too close to the situation to teach me. Jim took control of the matter and, armed with an encyclopedic knowledge of the five boroughs, took me everywhere I needed to be, in good weather and bad, in traffic or at night, and helped me conquer the phobias plaguing me just in time for my freshman year to begin.
Those three examples are but the tip of an enormous iceberg in the friendship that I and my parents enjoyed with Jim. He was the greatest friend, most loyal protector and staunchest advocate my family ever had. And today we lost him.
He was a husband, father and grandfather, a brother, an uncle and a son. To our small family he was a friend like no other.
He was no shrinking violet. He could be gruff and possessed of a humor that would make Archie Bunker blush. Political correctness never entered his vocabulary and for us, he was a refreshing breath of fresh air. Every time he saw you, he greeted you with a joke, and even if I heard it ten times already I wanted to hear it again.
He was not someone you wanted to run afoul of, but if he liked you, you had a lifelong ally, a man who would go to the ends of the earth, and often did, for those he loved. In my eyes he was heroic, funny, larger than life and one of the few men I respected as much as my own father. I loved hearing him regale us with stories of his tough, city upbringing or his days teaching evil doers a well deserved lesson, or his run-ins with all manners of New York City’s dark underbelly.
He was of a time and place that exists only in memory now, a man’s man who showed his affection for you by hanging a nickname that stuck for life. In my case it was Carmine the Hammer. For over 30 years he addressed me by that moniker and it made me feel special, unique and cool.
By its very nature, friendship can be transitory and fleeting. We choose certain people to share our life experiences with. Over the course of time they may fall away for one reason or another. There are some friends, however, that transcend even family. Family, by its nature, is permanent, but the bonds of blood don’t always ensure closeness.
Jim was a friend we considered more than family. We chose him and he chose us. He stuck by us through every dark moment and with each passing year, demonstrated a loyalty I can only describe as fierce. He taught me the true meaning of friendship. It is an example I can never hope to live up to, but one I should aspire to every day in his memory.
