Brian's Saga

Brian and I have been bowling, pizza, college and Halloween buddies, and lived in adjacent Smith and Salley residence halls at Florida State University a year after students had elected Bill Wade by 150 votes to be Homecoming Princess in 1980.

"Billie Dahling," as his name appeared on the ballot, was crowned at the Homecoming Pow-Wow, and his name was announced during Halftime at the game, but he was barred from the football field. He lived in Smith Hall, and one weekend evening after work at Mr. G's Pizza, I brought a pizza, and Brian and Bill and I ate pizza together and hung out in the Smith Hall lobby all night long. There was no air conditioning in Smith Hall at the time, and it was not uncommon for residents to crash in Smith's spacious downstairs lobby that had open windows.

Brian and Charlie were neighbors in Alumni Village in the late 1970s and we often went out together. Banks paid interest back then, sometimes six percent, and even accepted third-party personal checks on deposit. Bowling and party expenses were minor at the time. We could buy a Mr. G's cheese pizza for $4.12 including tax and I remember a particular check we passed around for one of our share for $1.03 that eventually received seven endorsements on the back, two from Brian, before it was finally honored by my bank.

Brian invented spam in Spring 1982. I would often see him at the FSU Landis Green fountain talking to people as I walked to class, and then see him there again when I returned. On one of these visits, Brian said, "Mitch, if we write everyone we know and ask each one for money, some of them will send us money!"

On July 5-6, 1982, several of us stayed up all night at that same fountain watching a lunar eclipse.

Brian and my telephone booth costume and I rode in Brian's convertible to the Phyrst on West Jefferson Street next to FSU campus on October 30, 1985, and I won first place in the costume contest.

On Halloween the next evening, I took my Big Choice Crane Game costume to the Holiday Inn Sugar Mill Tavern on North Monroe Street and met Peter there with his headless costume and we won all the big costume contests, for Most Original, Scariest and Best Overall.

We each won cash, and I won a trip to Panama City Beach, and Peter won a limousine trip to a concert. He picked me up in the limo after the concert and we cruised around town for a while. I bought my own headless mask after that night and used it with a working guillotine I built to win several costume contests in 1991.

Brian graduated with a degree in Business and moved away to direct commercials and films in New York and then Los Angeles, and we didn't see each other often in the intervening years until his wedding, but we did a good job of staying in touch.

Brian designed and patented special camera lens filters filled with liquors, liqueurs and other liquids through which to photograph subjects relevant to the liquids. He shot the American south through Luzianne ice tea, Mexico through tequila, Montreal through maple syrup, and Ecuador through fruit juices. Among others. In 2006, Brian was named Photographer of the Year by the International Color Awards.

In 2001, I received and accepted an invitation to Brian's Labor Day weekend marriage to Ruthann in Halifax, Nova Scotia. I selected steak for dinner the evening before the wedding and lobster for the wedding night. I never ate lobster before, and so I decided to try it in the region where it's known to be best.

I was to be gone for three days and two nights, and I ultimately spent all but about eight hours in transit one way or the other. I was delayed to the wedding in Atlanta, and then by the time I arrived to Boston Massachusetts to connect to Nova Scotia, I had missed my plane and my steak dinner. Charlie and Laurel and their daughter were also connecting through Boston and had fortuitously arrived early, because Logan airport wouldn't let the infant fly without documentation. Laurel had to drive to Hartford Connecticut to obtain a birth certificate, leaving Charlie and me and the baby in a stroller with a mountain of luggage in the Boston airport until she returned.

Charlie and Laurel and their daughter eventually caught their connecting flight, and Delta Airlines put me up in the airport hotel until morning. I finally arrived at the Halifax Westin Hotel less than an hour before the wedding began.

Besides a few Halloweens, and my wedding in which Charlie served as Best Man, this was the only occasion on which I coordinated apparel with a guy. It was a 1930's style wedding, so Charlie and I dressed in appropriate gangster attire, and if we had traveled a couple of weeks later, we probably would have arrived without our violin cases. By the time I arrived in Halifax, I only had time to check in, shower, and put on my zoot suit and carry my violin case and present downstairs to the wedding.

Brian had stated in the invitation that if guests wished to give them anything for a wedding present, then a bottle of wine would be most welcome. Charlie's gift was a giant wine bottle that he inflated before adding to the gift pile in the hotel lobby, and mine was a bottle of red wine wax candle.

Charlie and Laurel and their daughter and Charlie's parents and I and other guests exited the hotel and were escorted by Halifax's version of the Keystone Cops onto a double-decker bus. They told us we were being transferred to the "hoosegow," which was really an edifice next to the hotel, as we later learned there was an indoor hallway leading back to the hotel, and the bus ride was very short. It was my tour of Halifax. Once there, we were photographed by more "police" and then allowed to attend the party. The women were clad in flapper dress and the men were dressed like Charlie and me, but only Charlie and I carried violin cases.

There was little delay. The "prisoner" guests arrived and were photographed and booked within about fifteen minutes. Brian and Ruthann arrived with their seconds and officiator and they gathered in a central area with us around and the ceremony lasted less than ten minutes. When the bride and groom were announced to the crowd, I emptied a can of silly string onto them, which they took graciously right before dinner began.

I don't like crab, and learned then for the first time that my premium lobster tasted like crab.

We were each given a pint-sized galvanized steel bucket with peanuts and a sheaf of play money, with tactile consistency not unlike Pour Paul's money in Tallahassee, in $50 and $100 denominations. I recall it being a few hundred dollars. Then it was casino night and there were most of the usual games. It was fairly easy to win at gambling, as odds were slightly less inhibited than usual, and the "money" guests won was to be spent on a silent auction for loot at the end of the evening.

I played with the band.

I circulated through the crowd but gravitated to the blackjack table and socialized with the guests. I had traveled a long way to gamble at this particular casino and called myself "Florida Mitch." I took gambling pretty seriously that night. I rarely gamble.

I had my eye on the largest of the evening's booty, a beaver crafted from the dyed product of some coniferous flora with carved flat tail, ears, eyes and teeth. It was receiving the most bids throughout the evening, and my aim was no less than to win more money than anyone else at the party could amass.

Gambling was intense until midnight and I am sure that without one person's intervention, my evening would have played out differently than it did. There weren't many children at the wedding, and all but one I recall was of toddler age. Early in the evening, I spotted a boy walking by with a stack of casino money in the breast pocket of his bow-tied suit and using my best Max Calvada voice, I shouted out to him, "Hey, kid!"

The kid stopped and I pulled out a dollar bill, gestured to him and said, "Ya wanna make some real money?" He looked interested, so I pointed to the "cash" in his pocket, which he readily tendered for George Washington.

"There's more in it for you if you bring me more of that money," I said, and he disappeared into the crowd.

Ryan, the bride's nephew, ran money for me throughout the evening. I didn't ask where it came from and paid him several more US dollars over a similar number of meetings, and he was happy, and it put me over the top. I paid four million dollars for my beaver, which I still have, and I gave my guitar to Ryan in gratitude, and he still has it. Thanks again, Ryan!

Happy 10th Anniversary to Brian and Ruthann -- Best wishes to you and your family!