A '54 Chevy and Jim & Jeff at UW-Whitewater.

Saw this 1954 Chevy pickup truck on my 5-mile walk around Culver City yesterday. Reminded me of my close friend, Jim Sickels.

I met Jim at college - it was my sophomore year and I had just become an RA (resident assistant). Here's a photo of him in an early blog post when I first started PASSION = TRUTH. I could tell you a hundred stories, all too lengthy and too much fun. We were RA's in Lee Hall, an all-male dorm and we thought we were the cocks of the walk. Save your pity...we had two all-female dorms in our immediate quad so it wasn't like we were without female company. And we were RA's, which meant we knew a lot of people all over campus. I introduced Jim to his current wife, Sandy. Stood up in their wedding - 19 or 20 years ago now. Jim and I remain as close today.

Anyway, he had a truck exactly like this. We used to tool around Whitewater getting into all sorts of trouble. In the winter, we'd drive through town and Jim and I would hunt down students walking to class. He'd pull over as far as he could in the right lane - just enough so that his tires would plow through the slush that had accumulated off to the side of the road. If he hit it just right, we had the luxury of turning around to see a wall of slush cascade onto the sidewalk and onto a student passing by. But the timing was crucial. We revelled in seeing some poor sonofabitch flipping us off. Good times. Come on...it was college.

We'd also take the truck into the Kettle Moraine State Forest and Jim would purposely drive the truck into a snow bank in order to get us stuck. Then we'd spend however long it took to dig the truck out of the snow. More good times. And when the weather was nice - particularly in the fall - we'd take the truck back in the Kettle Moraine, set up a card table with tea and smokes and study in the woods.

Ahhhhh....youth. Thanks, buddy, for all those memories. Jim's not the type of guy to hug another guy-friend. Or say "I love you" to a guy. Wasn't raised that way. Doesn't mean he doesn't "love" you - it' s just that his handshake means the same thing. But I'll say it here - I love you, Jim. My world would be empty without you.