horsemen, forever

There are people who stay with you, in your heart and soul, no matter the space of miles or years you've been apart. As Thanksgiving weekend approaches, I think about those people. Good ol' BR, Elmo, Chris V., and me ... we were inseperable there for three or four years. And the bonds of friendship we forged still bind us together in many ways.

BR and Chris V. don't exactly always get along these days -- they've grown up and grown apart, guys who have chosen their own paths in life. Personally, I think they probably disapprove a bit of one another's choices ... and maybe in some sense they're jealous of one another, too. I'd bet Chris V. envies some of BR's stability (career, wife & kids, etc.), while I know BR envies Chris's freedom. Elmo and I both moved away -- he moved first, but I moved farther. We lead our own lives, deal with our own drama, create our own networks of friends and extended family. But sometimes we come back together, too.

We called ourselves "the Four Horsemen" -- and if you mention that name to us, it would bring a smile to our collective faces. It brings back, for us, good memories of good (and often crazy) times. We were all there for one another. We backed one another up. We argued. Yes, we had our own personal, petty jealousies and faults. But we were also golden, in a way you can only be in your late teens and early 20s.

I'll see Chris V. sometime this weekend. We'll talk, we'll laugh. And neither of us will want the reminiscing to end. Hopefully BR will hang out with us. But we understand he's got other responsibilities and obligations. The ties that hold us as Horsemen bind loosely these days -- as life gets in the way, those bonds have stretched, but never broken.

It will do my heart good to see the men I still consider brothers.