Occasionally circumstances in our
lives will stymie our inescapable need to think about the future and what it
might bring. Sometimes making plans, marking calendars and even refining hope may hold
little attraction and therefore these thoughts are put aside.
Quite often when we experience
this crimp in our muse we will replace forward thinking with a trip down
memory lane, our revamped thoughts carrying us back to The Good Ol’ Days. Because
of recent circumstances I have found myself walking down this memory lane more
often than I am accustomed to. Whether this is avoidance or nostalgia does not
matter; that is a question for the counselor’s couch, a place I will not tread.
And sometimes our journey back to
The Good Ol’ Days is enhanced by a
real life confluence of the past and the present. For me that happened today
when I was able to spend time with and old friend in a place that was once my
stomping ground. Brian Prince has been a friend for more than forty years (it
is hard for me to even admit that forty years have actually passed), and has
always had impeccable timing when inserting himself back into my life. Our
small reunion took place at Jim’s Coffee
Shop, on the corner of Hildebrand San Pedro, where it has stood for more
than four decades. The coffee shop has changed in appearance, its menu has been
updated and the atmosphere leans more towards that of a meeting place than the
old neighborhood diner it once was.
So many hours were spent inside
this coffee shop back in the Good Ol’
Days. My memories of the 70’s would not be complete without the visions of
the red oxhide booths, the perpetually sticky table tops, the watered-down tea and
waitresses with names like Pepper and
Corky. Jim’s Coffee Shop
did not have a gourmet menu and quite often used a microwave instead of a
grill; fresh was a word of relativity
and not an expectation and the sanitation was often only in competition with a
frat-house…but it was our place.
Inside those booths friendships
were formed, relationships launched, off-colored jokes told and laughed at, broken hearts formed and then healed. It was a place where we could be judgmental
or be judged. It was our place. We didn’t know that memories were being forged,
or maybe we did, but we were too busy being teenagers to consider such sentiments.
So who is “we”? Seven young men
from Thomas Edison High School formed this pack, which one day would be
christened The Magnificent Seven. (Some
may argue that in fact there were nine, but that argument should only take
place with all seven present, perhaps sitting around a table in Jim’s). The thing that amazes me is that
after forty years these seven not so
young men are still good friends.
We have all lived our separate lives, sometimes
miles apart. Some married high school sweethearts…some divorced the same. We
have become parents and then grandparents. We have gained weight and lost hair
(some laying claim to both). And we have remained friends.
I struggle to remember what
brought this group together; I just know that one day we were all there,
crammed into a booth at Jim’s Coffee
Shop, drinking tea (free-refills) and solving the problems of the world, or
at least talking about girls. We had something special…we have something
special. I don’t know what it is that has allowed this bond to remain strong
after so many years. Brian once suggested that I write a story, a memoir, about
the Magnificent Seven. I considered it and even started to, but there was no Stand By Me moment in our lives that
could explain this everlasting bond.
If I could tell you what the something special is, I would. I would
package and patent it then share it with the world because everyone needs
friends like these.
After forty years I know I can
still call any of them and say “Meet me at Jim’s” and they will be there. They will
be there to listen to my woes and tell me to keep the faith. They will be there to talk about saving the world...
or girls. They will be there because they have my back, because they know I
have theirs. They will be there because there is something special about this
gang, this Magnificent Seven.
Brian, thanks for the pie, see you in the future!