(Editor’s note: Welcome to Living Eulogies. All recollections are accurate in the author’s mind only. Apologies in advance for everyone who has different recollection of the same event. No animals were harmed in the making of these living eulogies. Send all complaints to Elon Musk and Garth Brooks.)
There was always a buzz in the halls when a new kid showed up in school. Whether it was in the gold-plated hallways of Pound Ridge Elementary Schools or the more blue-collar dirt passages of Fox Lane High School, a new person’s arrival was like splitting off from the main timeline and creating an alternate universe in which a ton of new things were possible.
My high school best friend was a new kid, though when he arrived in NY from Texas in sixth grade (or was it seventh or eighth?) and I was assigned to show him around West House at Fox Lane Middle School, we pretty much hated each other. Funny how life works out.
At some point in high school, a new kid showed up and the chatter was unified: Josh was from Alaska. That made him almost as foreign as when Kentaro Nishikato (sp?) arrived from Japan in middle school.
Almost.
Josh Foehner and I shared one high school class together that I can remember, senior year English class with Mr. Freeman. Josh sat in the front row by the door. I sat in the back near Dennis Thyacz. I’m pretty sure I heard Josh maybe … maybe … utter a word during the entire time we worked on gaining our freedom by earning a diploma from the Bedford Central School District. Maybe one.
Thus, Josh, in high school, was just a bigger kid who fit well on the football team’s offensive and/or defensive lines and who seemed to largely want to keep to himself back in the day. We definitely didn’t run in the same circles.
Fast-forward to 2009.
Facebook could have been so beautiful. It started out as such. I was on MySpace and totally dug the fact that I could put a song on my page to reflect my current state of mind. Music is my life in many ways, and you can know how I’m doing by what music I’m listening to. Thus, MySpace was a window into my soul.
I’m pretty sure it was Meredith Fine who reached out on there one day and said I should try this cool new thing called Facebook. My wife had recently made a profile there, but I was a MySpace loyalist. But Merry told me a bunch of Fox Laners were over there and weren’t on MySpace, so I did the thing and started a Facebook page.
Like I said, Facebook could have been so beautiful. Those early days were beautiful, in many ways. I reconnected with so many people I hadn’t talked with in years. It was fun “friending” these people and then getting a glimpse into their adult lives.
One of those people I friended in the early days of Facebook was Josh. In reconnecting, it was actually just “connecting.” There was nothing “re” about it. I didn’t know anything about Josh when we were going through high school other than the Alaska thing. But on Facebook, we learned we had similar smart-assery and a weird love of old-school professional wrestling.
Then I started doing through my dark times. There were some years when I was really struggling, and I wasn’t ashamed to live the struggle pretty wide-open on Facebook. It seemed ridiculous to me then and seems ridiculous to me now that, if we have a heart issue, we’re unafraid to share that on Facebook and that people respond with some combination of prayers, thoughts, cards, meals and well-wishes, but if the ailment is with the brain, we fear The Stigma and discrimination. I know it’s ridiculous, but I’ve learned that stigma and discrimination in the workplace are real. Yet here I am, still talking openly about my struggles through the years. Dumb, I know.
But here’s the thing: Josh reached out.
I can’t type three more significant words coming from the perspective of one who’s battled brain illness for a long, long time. Brain illnesses make other people uncomfortable. We’re not uncertain about what to say to someone with kidney stones, but if the brain is ailing, we start to stumble all over ourselves. That leads many people to say nothing instead of potentially saying the dumb thing.
Josh wasn’t one of those people.
Josh reached out.
Not only that, but Josh kept reaching out. During this time, I wasn’t the easiest person to get to know. Sure, I shared a whole bunch of stuff on Facebook in an effort to try to fight the stigma and create a safer environment for others to share their struggles, but when it came to actual personal relationships, well, these brain ailments were a pain in the ass.
Yes Josh kept reaching out.
Over the course of time, we developed something approximating a friendship. He invited me to pay in a fantasy baseball league. Then a fantasy football league. We texted. We talked on the phone. Josh became someone I could turn to, even if it was just to get the struggles off my chest and feel connected to another human being. Brain illnesses can be tremendously isolating, but Josh made that less so for me.
Last year, I started my own fantasy baseball league. It’s called The Waffle House Fantasy Baseball League. The winner takes possession of a boss customized championship belt until a new champ is crowned. The person who finishes last has to spend 24 hours in a Waffle House, but can buy down his or her time … one hour for each waffle consumed and kept down.
It was natural to invite Josh to this, to compete alongside a variety of friends and family. I was looking for people who would have fun, who would talk shit and take shit talk with humor and not get all pissy. Josh fit that bill. (P.S. There are two new positions open for Year 2 of this league. If you’d like in, let me know and state your case!)
Then, I created the Drum For Shriners Fantasy Football League. Same thing for the winner of this league, but the last-place finisher would have to go outside a sports stadium with a bucket and something like a drum stick and a sign that says “I lost my fantasy football league and have to do this until I raise $100 for Shriners Hospitals for Children.” Josh was an easy invite to this … and then he went on to win the first season that just ended.
Kudos, Champ.
In the process of developing both of these leagues, I started sending out weekly texts to the participants, a wrap-up of the previous week’s action and a look ahead to the next week’s matchups. I gave people different nicknames. There’s me, The Commish, and my wife, The First Lady. There’s Nearly Silent Jim, because he hardly ever participates in the text fun. And then there’s Josh, AKA The Mad Alaskan.
It’s a combination of his love of professional wrestling and how I got to know him back in high school — as the quiet kid from Alaska.
Josh has been a good friend to me in times when I needed a good friend. I think that’s something we’d all love for people to say about us, and Josh should feel proud of the fact that he’s been that person for me.
So let’s raise a glass to our classmate, Josh Foehner, The Quiet Alaskan … The Mad Alaskan! Hear hear!
UP NEXT: Cheeseburger.
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