Friend in Life/Friends in Death

By Jerry Mack Grubbs

“Better get out the maps Jerry, we need to find a place to refuel,” Bill said. “I didn’t bring any maps. You’re the one who wanted to fly this thing home,” I said. “What kind of a pilot are you to not have any maps on board?” Bill asked. “Look who’s flying right seat,” I said. He laughed. I laughed. There was an easiness between us that had been there from the first time we met.

We were ferrying home an airplane we had purchased together in Houston, Texas. I had gone down first and checked out the airplane and after deciding it was what we were looking for Bill had flown down to meet me. Since neither of us was checked out in this type of plane we previously decided that we would have someone else ferry it back to Salt Lake.

With his customary self-assurance Bill said, “If between the two of us we can’t get this little plane home, we shouldn’t be flying anything.” With a brief checkout from the previous owner, we lit the fire in that little bird’s engine and headed for home. This was in 1987 before the days of GPS and all the fancy navigation devices found in small planes today. We droned along headed in a northwesterly direction that would eventually bring us into territory that would be familiar to us.

We started looking for an airport where we could refuel and purchase a few aviation maps. We thought we were somewhere over southern Oklahoma. When we landed we discovered that we were in Perryton, Texas. We laughed at the idea that we hadn’t had a clue what state we were even in. There was no one at the little airport. The door to the office was unlocked and there was a sign on the counter that said, “Be back in a few minutes, make yourself at home.”

After thirty minutes of waiting, Bill became impatient. He had been pacing the floor since we arrived, looking around the little cluttered office. “Let’s call a cab and go to town,” he said. “What will we do in town?” I asked. “We’ll get a motel and get something to eat. Then we’ll make a plan that will hopefully work better than the one we are following now,” he said.

After being dropped off and registering at the only motel in Perryton, we strolled down Main Street looking for a restaurant. Main Street was also the only street. We certainly weren’t going to get lost. There was only one choice of eating establishments. It was a combination bar and grill. Sliding up to the counter, Bill ordered himself a beer and a glass of milk for me. “My partner here has never been weaned so he’ll only be having milk tonight,” he chuckled to the bartender. I think the comment was meant to embarrass me but I merely said, “If you have very many of those beers I’ll have to do all the flying tomorrow.” Finding little else on the menu board over the bar, we ordered hamburgers and fries. With each beer Bill ordered, he ordered me another glass of milk with the same comment rolling off his lips, “Bring him another milk, he’s never been weaned you know.”

With nothing else to do in Perryton, Texas, we remained in the bar with Bill drinking his tall glasses of draft beer and me sipping my milk. The beer loosened Bill’s lips over the course of the evening and the fact that we were sitting in a bar with me drinking milk became more and more comical to him. He let everyone in the bar know that I was a little Mormon boy from Utah who had never been weaned from his mommy. Such behavior could have strained a less entrenched friendship. But that was almost twenty years ago and I am still not weaned. If he and I were to sit in a bar in Perryton, Texas or anywhere else today, I would still have my milk while he sipped his draft beer. Our friendship wasn’t tied up in a little neat package that required us to strive to be like each other. Our friendship was born of deeper roots. I believe the tips of those roots reached beyond this world and we just connected somehow.

Those roots are still connected and I think of you regularly, Bill McMahan. It isn’t just Memorial Day that brings out the memories but all the times we spent together, looking at ranches for you to buy or flying your helicopter to islands in the Great Salt Lake. I even remember some of the sack lunches we shared that my wife packed for us on our little jaunts of discovery. But I also want you to know that I am still not weaned. In fact I am drinking your share of milk since you aren’t here to enjoy it. I wish you were here but I would still want your portion of milk. I have never tasted beer but I can’t imagine it being better than milk. We were friends in life and we are friends in death. I miss you. I miss your kidding. I miss the easiness in which our friendship resided. Thanks for your share of the milk.