The last time I saw Frank was a little over 13 years ago on the Vegas strip. Caesars Palace was the exact location, I believe. Or maybe it was Treasure Island. The details are fuzzy. Either way, it's fitting that our next meet-up occurred at nearly the exact same coordinates, only a few Vegas-blocks north on a spot of land which, back then, had been the grounds of the Desert Inn, but today is home to the Wynn/Encore towers.

Frank was one of my closest friends in college. We shared an apartment for two years. We had adventures. We made stories. Some of them we struggle to remember now. Others we try hard to forget. After graduation, Frank went to LA to work in the movie business. I spent the summer in DC interning at the Kennedy Center. By early fall, I still had no idea what I was going to do next. So instead of coming to terms with this reality, I did what any self-respecting escape artist with a penchant for the romantic would do: I took a cross-country road trip, sleeping in the bed of my truck, and charging the entire thing to my one-and-only credit card, on which some crazy bastard at one of our well-run banking institutions had recently given me a $10,000 spending limit.

So after travels through the Smokies and Texas, and an extended stay in New Mexico and The Grand Canyon, I turned up in Vegas with a German hitchhiker in tow. And Frank and I met up for a day of gambling (with limited funds) and dinner at the cheapest buffet we could find on the strip. Frank suggested I keep going on to LA and hang out at his place for a bit, and I wish I had done that. Because then it would have been a true "coast to coast" trip. And who knows what that fork in the road might have brought. I might have wound up with a career in porn and a nickname like "Ramrod." But I had already been traveling for about three or four weeks by that point, and the credit card was filling up fast, and I was starting to think maybe I should get back to my "real" life, whatever that was going to be. Plus, and I'm not proud to admit this, I think there might have been a girl on my mind. Christ. Isn't there always?

So we hung out for the day and then he went back to LA and I started my long trek back to DC, heading north on 15 through Utah and taking 70 through Colorado and the great flat farm country of Kansas. There's no way I would have believed you if you had told me I wouldn't see Frank again for another thirteen years.

We both have some gray hairs now, though I have quite a few more of them than Frank. And we dress nicer than we used to, mainly because we have women in our lives who are good at telling us what looks good on us. (Not plaid, it turns out.) But other than that, we are exactly the same. And it was really, really cool to hang out with him and his other friends this weekend for his bachelor party. I laughed harder this weekend than I have in a long time. It's a horrible cliche to say, but even though I hadn't seen Frank in 13 years, it felt like it was just yesterday. I think one reason people tend to express it this way is that they find there just isn't that need to "catch up." I mean, even though Frank and I chatted some about our lives and what had been going on, that wasn't what was important. Which isn't to say I don't care about those things, it's just that my friendship with him doesn't depend on "facts." It was just cool to hang out, drink, share some stories, exchange wisecracks, and look at women. (Don't worry Kelley, only I looked at women. Frank was a saint.)

CS Lewis nailed it when he wrote: "Friendship...is uninquisitive. You become a man's friend without knowing or caring whether he is married or single or how he earns his living. What have all these "unconcerning things, matters of fact" to do with the real question, Do you see the same truth?" I guess Frank and I see the "same truth," though I don't know if I would necessarily express it that way. I'm uncomfortable with the word "truth" and other forms of "absolutism," so I feel better calling it a "more-or-less shared philosophy." And an appreciation for the same jokes.

Also, I have to add that one of the great things that happens when one of my good friends gets married is I end up meeting a bunch of other people who I also really like. Because close friends of close friends have a way of getting along.

Of course, it didn't hurt that we were inebriated the entire weekend and that we started things off at a titty bar. That's some truth I can feel comfortable with.


(If you're interested, there are pics here.)

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