Imagining another day with a friend
Let's make some stuff up in order to ease the mind and the soul.
The newspaper on the table made me think he was happy to see me, but that wasn’t the case. For as long as I had known him, Troy wasn’t a newspaper guy. He was someone who didn’t seem to chase down a machine and give it money to get the news and opinion. A fast-talking soul like him could craft a take and find out what happened before the sports section could be reached.
In typical Troy fashion, though, he craved a newspaper only when they were set to go extinct. In the years when their appeal was fiery and widespread, the appeal to this ahead-of-time soul wasn’t as strong. Here he was on a 2025 afternoon scanning the sports page for the standings. While it was only June, the games started to matter more as the calendar aged. He always found a backdoor to a train of thought that nobody else cared to walk through.
Troy had seen it all, facing trials and tribulations that would have put most people on the mat for good. Surrounded by plants and trees in a coffee shop, the java jungle as he playfully nicknamed it, he seemed content and satisfied to be drinking a cup of coffee, and could walk and drive a car already. I sat down without saying too many words. With him, it was better to get a feel for where his temper sat in the crowd before assuming that a joke or opinion could be dispensed.
Troy knew how to cut the shit in a room without even moving a muscle. One time when Shaw’s was as packed as the square footage would allow, he asked if I gave my ass the extra and much-needed final wipe before leaving the toilet. There was nothing he wouldn’t say out loud in a room full of strangers. It’s not like you couldn’t take him anywhere; it was more about whether or not you could hang with him in any given space.
Age hadn’t trimmed too much of the edge off of his personality. Having beaten cancer over two decades ago, Troy had the clout to brag about being around, along with a strong personality. The person who had him decided to make one more and quit while they were ahead. He had a little sister whom I knew from conversations, emails, and occasional visits. Bianca was tough and could talk as quickly as Troy, but she was sweeter than her brother. As he once put it, she was like me with a couple of packets of sugar thrown in for good measure.
Troy wasn’t an acquired taste, but he made you work for his company. Most people allow you to share the space and be a part of something. With him, you had to handle the pressure of being roasted and dish it back without making too much of a scene. Today, we were discussing Cardinals baseball and whatever else came up in the conversation. A cup of coffee became two, and then a third was brought along. Conversations were like prospects brought up from the minor leagues: How many cups of coffee would they get before being sent back down?
The conversation with him that day wasn’t meaningful. The time spent with him was all that mattered. After all, time is currency in any decade of life, no matter where it happens to sit. We discussed the struggles in my personal life and how tomorrow always seemed to supply an extra can of paint to make something new and better. We talked about being a can short every day. The age and height of my son were brought up, and that’s when Troy smiled widely and long.
When he smiled, one had to pause and take in the moment. He would laugh at his jokes on occasion, and if he knew one of his chirps hit a nerve, but a genuine smile was something else. Having known me before Vinny was born meant that Troy got to witness the entire evolution of a Buffa creation. As he eloquently put it, he knew him when I was crazy enough to be a father and then when I was dumb enough to think I could handle the pressures of being one. It was loving chirps. It was proof that he cared.
It was only when my son was mentioned that his smile would linger for a few minutes. The Cardinals, hot streak or not, only got contempt and glares from his expression. The fear of a Miles Mikolas start during a critical game made him nervous. Jordan Walker was burnt toast, according to him. He longed for the Albert Pujols dominance that made St. Louis baseball so much easier to digest. He gave Sonny Gray crap for creating the art of pitching so complex to explain, and for leaving games earlier than Chris Carpenter would have. He gave Oli Marmol crap about his beard.
None of it felt personal, but he said it with purpose. Baseball was a lifeline to him. He needed it, and it required his righteous aggression. Somehow, today felt different. We were having coffee and talking baseball.
In reality, Troy has been gone for over two decades. That cancer that I talked about being beaten took him down, chopping down a beautiful tree. Some days, I like to think about a world where he’s still here giving shit and taking names. I miss him more this year than I ever have.
If you have a Troy in your life, keep them close. Life isn’t infinite, and fate is greedy with good people. Rest in peace, my friend. I’ll get the paper.
