Once upon a time I knew a guy named Keith. Used to hang in the neighborhood where I grew up when we were teenagers. Played bass guitar. He was kind of squirrely, but fun to be around.

Sometime in 1976 he went off to play bass with a band throughout the Midwest. Lots of gigs. Lots of driving. After a few years he was tired of it and settled in Macon, Georgia. Got married. Had three kids. Got divorced. Lots of drinking. Lots of drugs. Eventually wandered north to Atlanta where he made a living as a pickup player for bar bands. Not sure how well that worked out for him, but he later said it suited him just fine.

I ran into him again in the spring of 2000 at a Walmart store checkout counter near his home town of Rialto, California. I had a two bottles of propane for my camp stove in my cart. He was carrying a 12-pack of Budweiser in one hand and a bottle of Jack Daniels in the other and asked me what I was up to. Told him I was on my way to meet up with some old high school friends at the beach for a couple days of camping and that he was welcome to ride along. And that’s how we started hanging out again.

Our friendship didn’t last long, however. Turns out Keith was a mean drunk, and a few years later I happened catch him at home on the phone after he’d had more than a few drinks. He said in no uncertain terms that we weren’t friend, never had been friends, never would be, and to go fuck myself.

Well, that was unexpected.

That’s Keith in the photograph, on another beach camping trip. Crazy motherfucker’s gone now and that’s one of the few photographs I took of him.