Weekend With Larrys

 

Recently, I spent some weekend time with two of my friends named Larry. They don't really know each other, but they may have met once years ago. They both entered my life around the same time in the late 80's or early 90's.  A couple of Friday's ago, I went to see one of my Larry's play with his band in Leominster, MA. I have always needed nicknames for my Larrys, so my friends could tell them apart when I spoke about them.  This particular Larry was originally known as "Larry Lasagna" due to the fact that his actual last name contains many of the same letters as the word "lasagna." He is currently known as "Guitar Larry" which is probably a more suitable nickname, as he is a fantastic guitar player.

     I met this Larry at the Stormy Monday bar located in the old Country Gourmet restaurant in Merrimack, NH.  The Country Gourmet was located where Buckley's restaurant is today. Larry played there with a band called the "Swanky Moes" and I cannot guess how many times I went there to see them, or how many people I forced to come with me. I also can't imagine my total bar tab there, as I used to like drinking beer back then.  We developed a nice friendship through our musical connection. Sadly, the Swanky Moes split up and followed different musical paths throughout the region. I gave Larry my number to call me if he started up a new band. Now this was in the old days before MySpace, Facebook, text messaging etc... I wasn't sure if I would ever hear from my friend Larry.  Days turned into weeks and weeks into years, until one day I came home and had a voicemail message from Larry on my home phone!  The clouds lifted off of my musical life and I was back in business as a groupie!

     Over the years, I have gone to see Larry play all over New Hampshire and Massachusetts. I love his guitar playing and the songs he likes to play. All of the times I have seen him have been enjoyable. We have had some memorable moments as well.  We gave hair-styling tips to a young woman at the Strange Brew.  There is a good chance she never went out in public again after that exchange. I witnessed a woman willingly get spanked for her birthday for three hours in Lowell, MA while the band played on. Larry saved me from an ill-advised romantic interlude in Goffstown, NH with a woman with a nice sweater. Larry's guitar playing makes the ladies crazy! I think what might be our fondest memory however, is when I went to see him at a restaurant/lounge/hotel in Rochester, NH.


Not only did I get to listen to him play, but I expertly ordered the ham steak dinner while I was there. Easily the greatest ham steak dinner of my life. It even came with freshly canned pineapple. No lie, one of the best meals of my life and  I owe it all to Larry.
 

Larry & Mark

Now my friend Larry has reunited with his Swanky Moes band mates and formed the L&M Rhythm Kings.  It would not be right to talk this much about Larry and not mention his sidekick, Mark.  He is another great guy, great musician, and someone I am happy to call my friend.

       

I saw my other friend Larry on the Saturday afternoon, following the Friday night that I saw the Larry described here already.  There was no more difficult way to describe that.    This Larry is simply referred to as "Old Larry" or my "OLD friend Larry" within my inner circle.
   

I met this Larry at a job soon after college. My boss told all of her staff that we were getting a new employee who just left the Air Force. I was expecting a young, clean-cut guy to be joining our team, but instead we got a guy who already had completed a full career in the Air Force. I didn't know if he ever saw active duty, but I was fairly certain he was involved in the majority of skirmishes that our country was ever part of. We initially became friends due to our mutual love of the Boston Celtics. Eventually, we discovered we enjoyed a lot of the same music as well.  Since then we have gone to many concerts together and exchanged a bunch of CD's. I should also mention that this Larry also played in a band called "The Delrays," a few decades ago. The only song I remember from the cassette he played for me, was of him singing "Proud Mary." I don't think Mary, or anyone else would have been proud of his vocals. It wasn't all bad however. He met his lovely wife Barbara while part of this band. They have been together ever since.

     Despite a little age difference, we have managed to have lots of fun and laughter over the years.  One of my favorite gags that I pulled on him was when he was looking for work years after we worked together, and I setup an interview for him where I was working at the time.  He left his Winter coat in the lobby when he went in for the interview. While he was in there, I filled up the sleeves of his coat with crumpled up paper. When he came out of the interview and tried to put his coat on, he couldn't get his arms in the sleeves!  It was the funniest thing I ever saw! Eventually, he pulled all of the paper out and got his coat on. I am not sure if the interviewer saw his struggle with the coat, but he did not get hired.

 He got me back though a few years later though.  One of my friends seeded and worked on putting in a lawn for me. That night Larry came over to visit. He always had a hard time backing out of my long driveway, so he decided to turn around on the lawn.  I yelled at him from the front door and he just cranked up "Fun,Fun,Fun" by the Beach Boys and gave me the middle finger as he drove on the lawn.  He still denies this happened, but it did.  I certainly wouldn't put it in my Blog if it wasn't true.

   
I have learned many things from Old Larry.  He has shown me incredible generosity and thoughtfulness over the years. He is also a tremendous friend-keeper.  The guy has friends all over the country and has a great ability to keep in contact with them. Larry has also shown me that you can survive a personal tragedy and still carry on with your life for all of the other people around you that need you. I am in that group that need him. He has amazing inner strength.
   


Larry is also ultra-talented in the world of fly tying. I knew nothing about this art of tying flies for fly fishing, but I learned a lot from him. His work has appeared in many books.  For me, the most impressive thing is that he actually had a postage stamp made with one of his flies pictured on it!  Is that nuts? I say yes.

     So those are my two Larrys. I love both of these great guys.  There are lots of things I don't have, but I am blessed to have many good friends like these two dudes.