My Friend Gave Me a New Motorcycle

It pays to be kind

Photo by David S on Unsplash

Vaughn and I met in the mid-1980s. For us, it was a wild, crazy era of heavy metal music, drugs, excessive drinking, and eschewing laws, social norms, and standards of general decency.

I had long hair, played guitar, and ramped up my marijuana business after getting unceremoniously fired from Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Vaughn was a short Mexican guy who also had long hair. After years of intermittent crack cocaine binges, drinking to oblivion, and jumping from job to job, Vaughn struggled to find a better life.

He got married, had several kids, and joined the US Navy. Before bootcamp, we had a going away party for him at a local motel room. He got wasted, had extramarital sex with a young woman in the bathroom, and in the process, broke the toilet right off the wall. It was their first and last sexual encounter (thank God), but the repercussions of that act would alter their lives.

Many years later, Vaughn found out she got pregnant, and he now had another daughter.

While he initially performed well in the Navy, his restlessness and addiction once again upended his life. He started to binge crack again. He was absent without leave several times. One night, he literally jumped off a ship, landing into the frigid waters. He…