A Best Friend Remembered

IVAN Donnie is dead now. I don't remember what day he died. But , I remember the day he died. It was the saddest day I've ever had. Donnie was a printer, duck hunter, fisherman, boater, deer hunter, lobsterman and diver. But the one thing he did better than anything else was being a friend. To me and to many others. Especially those who shared his tenet. I'm sure there are many varied opinons on what that was. But,to me it was simple. Help others whenever you can, find humor in almost everything and don't do anything to cause anyone anguish. Unless they deserve it. HALLIDAY I met him at Halliday Lithograph. A printshop with hundreds of employees and very large offset presses. I eventually became his press helper on a large Crabtree perfector and a Harris twocolor. Halliday was a fun place to work. Donnie and a few others were the main reason for that. We were on the Crabtree one night and a pressman named Dave was running the adjacent Harris. Dave was another who made Halliday interesting. Dave thought it would be a good idea to roll 5 lb. ink cans across the platform to where Donnie was standing about 20 feet away. The first ones fell off the platform uneventfully and the third fell into thedelivery platform well. The cover came off and ink was oozing onto the floor Unconcerned, Dave rolled a forth that hit Donnie in the ankle. Donnie pointed to the can in the well and suggested that it would probably be a good idea if I cleaned it up. While I was doing that, Donnie went to the electrical shop to get a 10' piece of 1/2 " electrical conduit.

He then took a feeder sucker, (a flaired piece of rubber), and forced it onto an etching needle. An etching needle is an 8" by 3/8" wooden dowel with a 1/2" needle-like tip. At this time OSHA hadn't yet restricted the pressure in air lines and the house air was around 120psi. Donnie laid the conduit on the easel. Inserted the suckersheathed needle with the airhose nozzle behind it. Dave was oblivious to this and was somewhat more than mildly surprised when the needle went whizzing by his arm with enough force to pass clean through the corrigated aluminum wall and out into the parking lot. I looked at that hole for years when coming into the building. To my knowledge Dave never rolled an ink can at Donnie again. Or anyone else for that matter. Did I mention that Donnie was an artillery gunner in the army? Donnie promised to take me coot- shooting (sea ducks). He would supply the wood if I would build some blocks. He explained that, because sea ducks often flew at speeds of 60mph and many times the sea was a little choppy the blocks had the over sized silouettes. That there should be 7 or 8 sets of two and each set should be slightly smaller than the next so they could be stacked for easy transport. I then drew several oversized duck likenesses on a piece of cardboard laying on the press easel. He chose the one he liked best and I cut it out to use as a template. Only when I had finished cutting did I realize I had cut into the printing plate under the card board. The press was down for about 20 minutes while I had a new plate made. Donnie persuaded one of the girls in prepress to put a 12" spider crab in a toilet in the ladies restroom.

Dick Cochran damn near lost his job over that one. Everyone figured that he did it because he was a diver.(of course the crab was alive) One night while running the Harris he asked me to watch things while he took a nap. He sat down on the stool, put his chin on his fist and within minutes was out like a light. Of course he kept his eyes open so that if the foreman walked by he wouldn't know Donnie was asleep. Several times after work we would leave his car in the parking lot so I could drive him to his girlfriend's house. I would then go to the bar and suck down a few cold ones while I waited for him to call. He knew his wife would be looking for him and this way she couldn't find him. NEBC It was Donnie's influence that landed me the job there. I was extremely underqualified for that position. It was only with his help and the other great guys there that I was able to survive. In 3 years there I learned more about printing than I did in 19 years at Halliday. HUNTING We spent a lot of time coot-shooting. I still picture him with his Browning 12ga in one hand and a fishing rod in the other. Wind chill at -20.(Coot are eiders, scoters and old squaws). Often times after coot-shooting, on the way back in we would stop at Clark's Island to shoot some bunnies. The place was overrun with them. One time we spread the coot blocks just off the beachand Donnie took a stand over them while I went traipsing after some rabbits up on the Island. I was just taking a bead on a crow passing by when I heard a couple of shots from the beach and the crow veered sharply. Several seconds later it was raining #4 shot. I kept a few of the little black marks on my wrist just to prove to him that he had shot me. He had a Labrador named Tramp. A wonderful dog, but he had

an attitude. When Tramp went out in the boat with us he would perch himself on the bow, regardless of the temperature, watching for ducks. This dog could tell the difference between a duck and a cormorant when the bird was a half mile away. A duck was cause for the ears to perk up and the tail to wag while a cormorant only warranted the briefest of glances. The attitude reared it's ugly head when you shot at a duck and missed. From his throne at the bow he would emit stares full of machetes. He got pissed. When a duck went down, he was in the water before the duck . 30 degree water! Tramp had what I assumed to be doggy asthma. With one hand, Donnie would pull this 110 lb dog back in the boat by the scruff of the neck. The dog would start to wheeze terribly. Donnie would put his thermos cup full of hot coffee on the floor and after a few lap-ups Tramp was back on the bow, ears flapping in the breeze. When pheasant hunting Tramp was constantly stopping to watch us. He had a superb sense of shotgun range and rarely wondered beyond it. Donnie said he never trained him to do this. In eastern Massachusetts the vast majority of pheasants are released birds. Some of these birds are used to people and have no fear. We were hunting Scusset on the Cape Cod Canal one day and ran across such a bird standing in the middle of a path. We both drew a bead on it waiting for it to fly.

Well, the foolish thing started walking toward us. We went back to the truck a few yards away and sat on the tailgate feeding this thing peanutbutter crackers. He would stay just far enough away so you couldn't grab him by the throat. We both tried. I finally left them in search for something a little more challenging to shoot at. I heard a shot and little later met up with a pheasant-toting Donnie. He explained that he wanted to smarten the bird up so he took a shot well off to the side but one pellet caught him in the back of the head. I had to believe him because for as fine a gun that his beautiful Browning was, it had a terrible pattern. The bird was delicious. One day on my back porch Donnie was practicing loading his new black powder rifle. After loading he asked what to shoot at. I pointed at a broken shingle on an old wishing well that was slated to be taken down. Neither one of us had any idea that my dog was asleep behind the well. I didn't know Labs could move that fast. Donnie had pinpoint accuracy with a bow. Almost. He had a broadside shot at a doe who thought she was well hidden behind a 3" sapling. Sure enough, with all that deer facing him, he killed the sapling. He cut out the section with the broadhead in it and put it on the mantle. On a duck hunting trip at the Snake River I was trying to decide the best way to traverse the hundred yards to the river with all the gear. I suggested we put it in the canoe and each grab an end. Looking at the woods and hill we had to conquer, Donnie

picked up his gun in one hand and the 15' canoe in the hand with no fingers and walked to the river. I carried the decoys,my gun and the thermos. On a night in the Berkshires in my makeshift camper there were 6 or 8 of us drinking beer and eating hot peppers. So of course the natural thing to do is have a farting contest. Donnie was the first to get driven out. What a wimp. In all the time I spent with him I never ever knew him to fart. I don't think he knew how. I won by the way. During deer drives, one or two people are put on stand while others comb the woods to flush out the deer. During one of his turns on stand, a deer was driven in his direction. Donnie never took a shot. Seems he had climbed half way up a tree and had his hand in a large hole when the deer went by. He wanted to know what lived in there. We were hunting Duxbury Marsh and decided to walk out to the cabin to make some coffee. After the coffee, we went out the door right into a blinding blizzard. With 10' visibility, no compass and an incoming tide we knew we had a problem. After wandering around for 45 minutes he heard a dog barking far away. That dog kept barking for twenty minutes until we got to him. 50' from my car. FISHING To keep warm while fishing those cool October nights, Donnie kept a bottle of blackberry brandy in his boat. (a tradition that I continued when I got my boat) On such a night we were fishing Warren's Cove and early in the night I noticed a large bright light way off in Cape Cod Bay. The hours passed and by the time we headed back to Duxbury Harbor we were pretty well shit-faced. While we were crossing the channel at the Bug Light, Donnie gunned the

boat and put me on my ass. I looked to see that light about 50' away and 25 feet high. It was connected to a huge trawler steaming into Plymouth. Neither of us saw it until it was right on top of us. On a trip to Provincetown the wind kicked up so bad that we couldn't get back to Plymouth. We got a mooring in P-town harbor for the night. About 3am an incredible noise woke us up and sent chills downour spines. In the morning at breakfast we learned that a local fisherman's son was an Air Force pilot and buzzed the tower in 40mph winds to let his dad know he was back at Otis AFB. The second or third time he let me drive his boat while he pulled his lobster pots, I cut one of them off. He said "You know you just cut that potline." Then in the same breath "Take it over to the Cordage and we'll get some flounder." He never mentioned it again. I replaced it with one of my super crab traps. DIVING On a dive trip in the Keys I noticed the tank they gave me had an expired inspection date. It was the last one they had so the dive master said he'd run home and get one of his own. While we were waiting the 60' dive boat and its 50 or 60 passengers left. Shortly after the divemaster returned with his tank, a 26' boat captained by a beautiful blonde in a bikini pulled in. Me, Donnie and three other divers took that boat and had a wonderful dive. When we dove Warren's Cove, we would anchor the boats a couple hundred yards apart so there would be a better chance of one being near in case of emergency. Being a heavier breather than I, Donnie was always back to the

boat before me. On this occasion, when I returned he was nowhere to be seen. After several minutes I decided to pull anchor and look for his bubbles. He finally surfaced at least 300 yards from his boat. When I reached down to get his catchbag I could hardly get it in the boat. In it were 7 keeper lobsters.(The normal dive would yield 3 at most) One weighed over 11 lbs. He said the lobster was swimming in the bag and pulling him in the wrong direction! We boiled it in the cover to my barbeque. It was the only thing big enough. THE KEYS One image of Donnie that always comes to mind occurred on the way to the Keys. We stopped to get some froglegs and feed marshmellows to the gators. When we turned around he was standing with a full set of froglegs hanging from his mouth. I can still hear his girlfriend say "You look so stupid." Coming out of Howard Johnson's Motel in Key Largo one evening, there was a scorpion in the walkway. I'm not sure if it was pissed off or was in a romantic mood, but it followed us up the walkway. It definitely wanted a piece of Donnie. True Love? OTHER MEMORIES One morning about 4am Julie woke me up and said that there was someone in the house. I got up to find Donnie in the kitchen making coffee. I asked him where he was headed and went back to sleep. A week after I came home from having back surgery he showed up and made me get dressed. He took me for an hour-long walk in a foot of snow. I felt really great afterwards and I'm convinced that walk sped up my recovery.

He came to my house one night and informed me that he had bought a bull. And it was in his cellar. WE agreed to keep it in my yard and split expenses. His name was Ed. Ed was impossible to keep penned and roamed the neighborhood in search of somebody to play with. Donnie came over one day to find Ed chewing contentedly on a nightgown. After determining that it belonged to my sister-in-law, Donnie took the mungie, green, mucus stained nightgown and returned it. He shared my feelings toward her. A favorite pasttime was to spend a Saturday night at the Plymouth launch ramp watching the weekend warriors load their boats. Always good for a laugh or two. Donnie and I were sitting on the wall with Dave O'leary and were approached by a pretty blonde 6-year-old. She was amazed by Dave's voice box. He had surgery for throat cancer. Dave said to her, "This is why you should never smoke cigarettes." Donnie stuck out his right hand with no fingers and said, "This is why you should never put your hand where it doesn't belong." (He lost his fingers to a manhole cover as a teenager) I pulled out my lower partial and said, "This is why you should always brush your teeth." She contemplated all this for a few seconds, nodded her head and went back to sit on the seawall and looked at the water. Never saying a word to her parents. I went to Boston from Florida to be with him in his final days. I really hope that he heard the last words I spoke to him: "Thank you, for everything." As I walked out of the room with tear-filled eyes I yelled "This sucks!" And it does.

Donnie is dead now. I miss him.