KIRK'S PENCIL
“He’d show up to a job on his own schedule, maybe sand a little drywall, then be gone for a day or two or seven.”
I met Kirk when I was in my 30s, a time when you’re not really in the market for new friends, but there he was. He and his partner, Frank, had moved from the East Coast to Indianapolis for Frank’s work, and I think Kirk was a little like “What have I done?” But we had the same sense of humor and within a very short time he was one of my all-time best friends. (In retrospect, I wonder where I placed on his list. He loved me, I know, but he had a ton of friends.)
He’d trained as an architect and renovated houses for a living. He’d show up to a job on his own schedule, maybe sand a little drywall, then be gone for a day or two or seven. But when I was home with my new baby and a little panicky and he was converting our attached garage into an office, he came every day for two weeks—showed up early and spent the whole day puttering around. This was early in our friendship and it was a great kindness, though he would have laughed it off and said he was only there to work.
We laughed a lot, in person and when we talked on the phone every couple of days. We laughed at the Vows column in The New York Times, at the rubes in the Indiana state legislature, at how much Tom Petty the local “progressive rock” station played. We laughed about the time his and Frank’s dog ate cat shit then licked our toddler all over, and the time my mom and I went to their pool and she thought all the guys in their Speedos were naked. Et cetera.
I was at work the day I learned that Kirk had died. He was at home and called his brother-in-law, who lived two blocks away, to ask for a ride to the hospital. When the brother-in-law got there--within five minutes—Kirk was already dead. He’d had heart problems, but as far as I’d known, they were under control. He was only 53! I was so shocked that I didn’t know what else to do except go straight to their house and be with Frank. Other people were starting to show up too, so I went down to their basement to get beers and wine for everyone, and I saw a can of pencils on Kirk’s workbench, and I took one.
It felt a little like stealing, but I had to. It was visceral; I had to have something of Kirk’s to hold. It’s a nice pencil—natural wood, soft lead. Kirk drove a beat-up pickup truck, wore worn-out sneakers and frayed T-shirts (or, for dressy occasions, worn-out khakis and frayed button-downs), but he was particular about some things. I knew him for almost twenty years, and he’s been gone ten, and this pencil means more than I can say.
–Liz Joss
