I was raised in an old house in the middle of Chebanse Illinois in the early 60’s. Chebanse was about 70 miles south and a world apart from Chicago. I moved out to my own apartment in 1976 but moved back in in 1978, enormous stereo and all, until I got married in 1980. Dad was not a fan of the stereo, which was the source of a few “conversations” between us, possibly fodder for a story later.

Chebanse was a great town to grow up in and I had friends all around me. During the summer, we could leave after breakfast and return home at dark without a care in the world. Just within a four block radius, I could count 12-13 guys I grew up with and would eventually attend school with the same motley crew.  Sadly, six of those guys – Tim, Donny, Danny, Greg, Robin, and Merritt have passed away all too soon. I never got to say goodbye to any of them.

Before high school, we played baseball in the summer, football and basketball in the fall, and ice hockey in the winter on real frozen ponds. Nothing, and I mean nothing, hurts like a hockey puck to bare shins in an Illinois winter. I learned to cuss, play poker, and smoke, along with some other nefarious activities with these jokers. I won’t go into that as this is a PG rated story.

We grew up listening to rock and roll on WLS AM radio, channel 89, and then later on a deeper WLFD rock channel before acquiring our own stereo systems. 

From the early 60’s, circa 1964 till about 1972 I grew up next door to a young man named Randy. Actually, I practically lived at his house. They had a storage cubbyhole above the couch in their den which was big enough to fit two youngsters in.  We’d just left our sleeping bags up there. We’d watch monster flicks on the TV until we fell asleep, night after night. Dracula, Frankenstein, and the Werewolf were all the rage back then.

We also spent hours in his basement hatching hair-brained ideas and parties. The best one I recall is when another neighbor joined us and we plotted to form our own rock and roll outfit. We were to name it Stevie and the Streamliners, as well as donning matching outfits with bell bottoms. This was of great concern to me as dad hadn’t allowed me to wear them yet. We tapped a fourth guy to be in our band, although I’m not sure if he was ever made aware of it. There was one major drawback on our career to being rock stars – none of knew how to play an instrument.

Later, Randy would move into a bedroom with twin beds with his own TV and I spent many more nights there, still watching monster flicks that by that time scared the bejesus out of me. Some nights we’d drift off listening to WLS play the song, “Going Out of My Head,” about every third song, I swear. I often ate dinner with his family too, although I never could eat his mother’s fried green tomatoes – a family favorite.

Randy’s dad was a coach for a few of our Little League teams. Randy played shortstop or pitcher while I mostly rode the bench, much to my great embarrassment. I fancied myself a great center fielder like the great Micky Mantle. We spent hours playing catch with a baseball, Frisbee or football in their enormous yard. Sometimes his dad joined us, teaching us how to lob a football in a spiral. In the winter months we spent hours playing ping pong in the family basement, becoming quite proficient at the game if I don’t say so myself.

I recall after one Little League game that Randy had pitched, a rival coach bet Randy he could catch his fastball bare-handed. Randy said he couldn’t do it. So, a bunch of us headed to Randy’s house to see if we could. Coach Jerry was a big man with big hands. Randy wound up and threw his best fast ball and sure enough, Jerry caught it bare handed. Randy would have to live that one down.

By the late 60’s Randy was allowed to grow his hair out, much to my eternal envy. My dad didn’t care for long-haired-hippy freaks, so I was required to keep my hair short, but I dreamed of having a full head of long hair like Randy’s. All these years later you wouldn’t think it was a big deal, but I’m here to tell you, it really was.

It was Randy who introduced me to what was termed hard rock back then. Today it’s called classic rock. I loved it at the first note – so much better than sugary pop, particularly “Going Out of My (damn) Head again!”  We listened to Black Sabbath, Wishbone Ash, Grandfunk Railroad, Mountain, Iron Butterfly, and Foghat for hours on end on Randy’s stereo, which was far superior to my tiny stereo. I bought mine for a hundred bucks with money I won in a drawing dad had entered in for me. I had enough money left over to buy a couple of albums with the money, which went toward double albums of Grandfunk Railroad and Steppenwolf. Dad was livid at mom and me at how I spent that money.

Randy was a year older, getting his driver’s license and a car when he was sixteen. We spent hours working on that car that summer, a gold Chevy Malibu I recall. He decked it out with a nice 8-track player and then later changed it out for an even better cassette player. I’m betting he still wishes he had that car.

That car would be the source of us getting arrested one cold winter night. Me, Cousin Chris (who else) and two other  friends, Greg and Scott, all fifteen at the time, were hanging out in front of the convenience store, freezing and spitting – we all spit a lot back then although I don’t know why – when Randy pulled up in his nice warm car. Having nothing better to do, we piled in and headed to nearby Clifton to get the car washed. We managed to get pulled over for driving “suspiciously” and having beer in the car – beer we hadn’t drank. Randy has partied with friends the night before and inadvertently left five Budweiser’s in their six-can plastic ring in the back of the car. (Did he only drink one beer the night before?) Well, we were hauled down to the Watseka pokey by three cop cars – one might have thought they captured the Dillinger gang instead of five boys with five warm beers.  

My extremely irate father and Chris’s mom had to come and bail us out – it was a quite an ear blistering ride home. Yes, he yelled at Chris too, so his mother didn’t have to. At one point I made the mistake of crying out, “How did I know the pigs would be out tonight” – a major blunder on my par. Who knew ear blistering’s could reach another gear. Today I have no idea where the use of the word “pigs” to describe the police came from as I never used it before nor since, but it was a major mistake on my part.

Well, all things must pass. When Randy went to high school we grew apart. He made friends with people from high school and later people over in nearby St. Anne. I felt squeezed out and hung with the guys I went to school with, getting a dish washing job in the local beanery making $2.50 per hour and a free dinner. Our interactions became sparser except when he had his girlfriend Jenelle over, and I managed to find reasons to wonder over to his house again. I think I had a crush on her.

Randy would go on to get married young, first living closer to Kankakee and later St. Anne. We went decades without seeing or hearing from each other. Truth be told, we kind of forgot about each other.

By the early 2000’s my son was playing Central Stars junior football and I became an assistant coach. I also had a seat on the board. My main job as a board member was to help raise funds, which included the annual golf fund raiser held at the old South Shore golf course owned by Colonel Jim Kassler, a man I would later know and admire.

After one particular fund raiser, the board members and a few golfers hung out under the long veranda to clean up and finish drinking beverages left over. About eight of us were sitting around a round picnic table talking about the money we raised. Suddenly, one of the gents, a man I didn’t recognize but was sitting right next to, said something about Chebanse that sounded eerily familiar to me. I looked at him for a few seconds before the light bulb went on.

“Randy?” I asked. Sure enough, it was the Randy I grew up next to all those years ago. I hardly recognized him as he’d gained a few pounds and cut his hair short. He evidently hadn’t recognized me either as I had gained a few pounds and sported the beard I’ve had continuously since 1996.

Today, as a couple of grumpy old men, we keep in touch occasionally, still promising to get together again socially, something that hasn’t happened yet. I’ve learned my lesson though with not seeing friends before they pass on though.

Randy, if you’re reading this, I promise we will get together again this summer, buddy.