The Pollack

The title of this post is a nickname - I'll get around to that in a bit. But the post is mostly about friendship...

I haven't had that many really good friends in my life - I can count them on one hand. And I've never been able to decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing :-)
The fact is the I don't understand most people - and it's mutual... I just see the world differently - and what I see does not make sense... It's like living in a Monty Python sketch... ("I did ask you not to say mattress, didn't I? Now I've got to stand in the tea chest!")
As I've mentioned before, my wife thinks it's Asperger's... From webMD: "the main symptom is severe trouble with social situations" - yeah, but I've discovered that if I smile a lot, keep my mouth shut and don't burst out laughing at inappropriate moments I can almost pass for normal :-) So yeah - I get by...

But every once in a while somebody "gets me" and I don't have to pretend to be normal...
There was Raymond in St. Louis - he became a chemical engineer, Robert in Philadelphia - now a pharmaceutical researcher, Gerd in Germany - now a gynecologist, and in Winnipeg it was my classmate nicknamed the Pollack -now a literature professor.
So yeah - they were all exceptionally bright - obviously, since they chose me as a friend :-)

Right... So the Pollack's real name is Peter Paolucci (PhD) and he teaches at York University in Toronto. I don't recall who started calling him the Pollack, but it stuck.
BTW - I emailed him about using his real name in the blog and he said it was fine - "I'm (still) proud to be your friend". So I guess I should be proud to use my real name too - it's Peter Galambos. (As if anyone reading this didn't know that already.) It's a surprisingly common name, so I should note that I'm the engineer / lawyer - not the German ophthalmologist / researcher, or the CEO, or the champion rower, or the Slovakian hockey player, or the kickboxing federation VP, or the Hungarian voiceover of Ross on Friends :-) So there ya go...

I don't remember exactly when Peter and I started hanging out (or when I found out he played bass guitar). But I do recall that (like me) he was quirky and clever, and (unlike me) he was very well liked... It's not so much that people disliked me - I think I was just so weird that they didn't know what to make of me. And the harder I tried to act "normal" the weirder I got :-) So I guess my point is that Peter and I were somewhat unlikely friends...

OK - I have to tell this story:
There was a kid in our class named Shapera (aka Shopsy) who could be a bit slow at times. One day Peter said something to Shopsy that confused him (not hard to do). And then this exchange happened - probably not 100% verbatim (it was 44 years ago) but really close:

Shopsy: You're nuts!
Peter: What about them?
S: Huh??
P: I said, what about them?
S: You're crazy! ... What are you talking about?
P: What are you talking about?
S: You're nuts!
P: What about them?
S: I don't get it...
P: Well, then stop talking about them.
S: Huh??? ... You're nuts!
P: What about them???
...
I swear it went on for over a minute... I was laughing so hard I was almost crying - it could not have been funnier if it was scripted... And Shopsy never caught on... Even to this day I can't think about it without cracking up.

Obviously, there's a lot more to the story of our friendship, and I'll cover that in future posts. But I've always been puzzled why people are so strongly 'wired' to need others in their lives - and why sometimes family isn't enough... I really needed a friend at the time - and Peter was the right friend...

Of course, for the past 35 all I've had are my wife and a few casual acquaintances. And that's all I've needed. I'm not saying it's been "smooth as silk" but when your wife is also your best friend the bumps in the road are barely noticeable...