I remember the day that I met my childhood best friend. It was 1976, and his family had just bought the house next door to us. One early Saturday morning, I got dressed, walked over, and knocked on their front door. His dad answered the door wearing a bathrobe. I asked "do you have any kids I can play with?" I was six years old.

We became best friends, and my parents became best friends with his parents. He was like a brother to me, and we did everything together. His parents were like a second set of parents to me. Our families vacationed together, went boating together, spent Christmas Eve together sharing a meal and exchanging gifts, etc.

In the sixth grade, my parents bought a new house on the other side of town, and we moved away from the neighborhood. He and I still got together pretty often, usually on weekends. While our parents were out doing whatever they did on Friday nights, he and I would rent movies, order a pizza, and hang out. He and I rode bicycles and motorcycles, and went fishing together. He would come with me when I would spend a couple of weeks at my grandparent's farm each summer.

We were in different school districts, so we didn't go to the same schools. As we got into high school, we got busier and busier with our own activities, friend groups, girlfriends, etc. Pretty soon we rarely ever saw each other. Our parents remained friends, so I still saw him now and then through them, and when we did see each other it was like nothing had changed. I was ahead of him in high school, so I graduated first. One weekend we went backpacking, and camped overnight. We talked about how we should get together more often.

That was the last time we ever got together as friends. Without even saying goodbye, he dropped out of high school, moved to Alaska to work fishing or crabbing boats, met a woman, and had a kid with her. He came back once to visit his parents, and I got to see him and his oldest son (who was probably three at the time) when my parents and I went over to visit. That was the early or mid 1990s, and I haven't seen him or spoken to him since.

He had a second child with the same woman, then up and abandoned them in Alaska to move to Tennessee with another woman. He's been down there ever since. He is estranged from his parents; I think they've seen him once in a couple of decades. I haven't heard his side of anything, but I can't imagine why he did all that.

I still think of him often. My best friend/brother who just left us all behind.