In 1951 a trio of 3-year-olds were pushing Tonka trucks in the sandbox of Jack & Jill Kindergarten. That was the nexus of a 74-year friendship among Pete Hires, Randall Bramblett and me.
Last April we planned a few laidback days in the wilds of the Altamaha River swamp. We were hungry to relive memories of our youth. One thing led to another, and the idea morphed into a mini reunion of our Class of 1966.
Randall and I would drive down from Athens. Pete, his son Justen, and grandson Carter would fly from New England. But as they say, “Life is what happens while you are planning to do something else.” Pete’s health grounded him in Massachusetts. The closest he got to the Altamaha gathering was a speaker-phone conversation with his classmates.
Pete, Randall and I agreed, “Let’s regroup for the fall.”
We hoped.
We prayed.
But by October, Pete’s declining health kept him hospitalized. The three of us stayed in touch through calls, texts and emails. Pete got his Christmas wish—home for the holidays. On Jan. 3 Randall and I got a text from Genie, Pete’s wife. Our friend, 77, had died in his sleep.
As the news soaked in, my mind drifted back to 1952.
We lived next door to Aubrey and Kathleen Hires and their son, Pete. Mr. Hires, the county school superintendent, and my dad, the undertaker, both wore starched white shirts and ties. They called each other “Neighbor.” (For the past 30 years, Pete and I have called each other “Neighbor,” too.)
It was Christmastime and frigid for South Georgia. Jack Frost had coated our yard’s St. Augustine grass with crunchy ice crystals. And my dad was worried. Mother’s father had died, and our family’s Dodge didn’t have a heater. He knew that we would shiver all the way to the Baker County funeral and back.
I couldn’t hear Mr. Hires’ big wingtips crunching his way to our house, but I will never forget the knock on our back door. “Neighbor,” Pete’s dad said to Big Dink, “here are the keys to my new Buick. Take Margie and the kids to her daddy’s funeral.” His generosity wasn’t a random act of kindness. It was just who Aubrey Hires was.
In 1985 I was honored to be a pallbearer at his funeral. When Pete’s mother, Kathleen, died in 2020, she was living with him in Rhode Island. He asked me to deliver her eulogy. The COVID-19 crisis and other unreversible complications prevented the memorial. But Mrs. Hires died knowing that she was one of my all-time favorite teachers.
After graduation from Jesup High School, Pete, Randall and I scattered. Randall carried his Rayonier scholarship to UNC-Chapel Hill. A football scholarship took Pete to Duke. And I cruised to UGA in the backseat of my parents’ teal-blue Buick.
For the next several decades, the Jack & Jill graduates were scrambling to create our families and our careers. But we kept in touch through a common link—music, Randall’s music.
Pete could jam on his electric guitar. I can plink on a piano. And we shared a celebration of our friend’s success and fame as a musician, a singer and a songwriter. Chuck Leavell, keyboardist of the Rolling Stones, once told me that Randall was on his short list of the most gifted on the planet. Pete and I agreed. But as expected, Randall, our humble sandbox buddy, blushed.
When you have more “yesterdays” than “tomorrows,” you hear the clock ticking. For Pete, it was ticking too fast. That’s why the swamp reunion was to be so treasured. But, again, life is what happens when you are planning to do something else.
Neighbor, it won’t be along the Altamaha River. But one day—“when the roll is called up yonder”—we will have that reunion.
Won’t we, Randall?
dnesmith@cninewspapers.com
