Sunday, April 5, 2020

what a friend we have


Steve Autman

a person’s life is a movie,
with only the star in every scene,
even those closest experience but fragments of the show,
maybe only a few stills,
maybe a rough recap of what happened at times,

my buddy Mark’s story started intertwining with Steve’s story
whey they were both ninth graders 
at Wilmington Friends School in Delaware,

by that point in the movie
the family was set:
a successful father working for Dupont,
a homemaker mother raising the kids,
a successful driven first born,
an older sister, another older brother,
and Steve, the baby of the family,
a charmer, whose people skills allowed him 
to break into the established social hierarchy of Wilmington Friends,
its 214 year history then full of inertia, like the cliques,
still Steve won his way into the hearts of his peers
to be president of his senior class,
even more what he loved was football,
where he was small, but fast,
quick like his sprinter father,
Steve was selected co-captain of the football team
and helped lead them to a winning season his last year,
including a victory over their major rival, Tower Hill,

Middlebury College called him as the 1960s wore down,

Steve and Mark found their way to Woodstock
for a few hours in 1969,
the magic some found there 
more a disappointing discomfort to them,

one of the great tragedies of Steve’s life
came with every law school he applied to
not answering his call,

so what did he do?
he threw himself into serving others,
spending his life working for non-profits,
always seeking to find a way forward for others,
such as the deal he finagled
for a city to donate a building outside of Philadelphia
and for him to find how to let it serve as incubator
for startup businesses who needed its help, his help,

Steve wanted marriage to work, so he tried it two times,

Steve wanted to write, so he worked and worked at it,
hoping for his words to help today become a better tomorrow,

Steve was always sensitive and felt keenly the effort
that others, and he, lived just to get through
present moments toward a better future,

as Steve’s life is winding down,
I hear of what an extraordinary person he is
through the words and soul of his good friend Mark,
who bonded with him in the ninth grade 58 years ago,
and who wants to treasure his memories of Steve
while both of them still remember
how each fits the other’s need,

though each of their movies
mostly runs along its own track,
Mark loves those scenes
in which they were co-stars.


by Henry H. Walker
April 3, ‘20

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