It has been years since I last saw Aris, maybe even more than a decade. I spent the latter 4 of my teenage years in Guam, and he was here (I am in Guam as I write this) with me. A lifetime later, he is still here, and is the same Aris that I grew fond of over those years. He is lean, strong, fearless, loyal, independent, and transparent when he has something to say. And for the record, I have never heard anything bad about anyone from him. For instance, last night he overheard our cousin Van get into a verbal confrontation with one of the tenants at their compound. When I asked him how bad it was, he answered simply, "Well, I guess one has to be drunk to say and act that way." He meant the tenant.
"You can use my truck!" was the first thing he said to me when we met. How about a neighborhood tour from you instead? So we started out with a walk with Micha around the block. Micha was his sister Arlyn's dog; she left her to Aris when she and her family transplanted Stateside.
Then we took a drive to Santa Rita to see Auntie Paz's house. If he weren't with me, there was no way I would have found my way through the neighborhood! That's how much I've suppressed it from my memory.
Then we went to Nimitz Beach to see our old swimming hole at the marina. It was a whole new world over there! Sea vessels from the size of yachts to 12' dingies took up moorage from one end of the marina to the other. And, there was a restaurant there!
We ran into a couple of old timers hanging around their pick-up truck. "Those are my friends," Aris announced. "We hang out all the time. It looks like they have octopus..." So we stopped.
At first they haggled over price. But in the end, the old timer said to Aris "I'll buy this for you," and handed over two octopi, ink still coursing iridescently under their skin. And the other old timer piped up "You know, Aris, he'll be here waiting for you when you come back from a fishing trip. He'll want some yellow fin!"
And that's how friends conduct business in the fishing co-op!
Aris cooked the octopus immediately. "You don't add anything to it. It will water up on its own, and you turn off the heat when the water has dried up." Then he mixed together lemons, limes, salt, red onions, scallions, lemon powder, and doni.
"How hot do you like your kelaguin?" he asked me.
I'll eat whatever you make!
He chopped up a half cup of the peppers he'd picked earlier that day, and mixed it in with the marinade. He looked at the mixture. He looked at me. He looked at the half cup left of doni. Then he chopped the rest of it up, and tossed it in with the octopus kelaguin.
He made the same marinade for a slab of yellow fin tuna, and another slab of wahu.
He made a mixture of Mamacita sauce and powder packet for a marinade for some pork ribs and shishkebobs. His son Terion and Terion's friend Xavier showed up with Bud Light, and we ate and talked through the night.
Aris and I have never stayed in touch. But this reunion was as if we'd never been apart. We picked up right where we left off. Aaaaah! I felt like I was 18 again!
"I won't live long," Aris said. "I don't want to be old and helpless."
Well, Aris, here's to youth and staying young forever!
