Monday, March 25, 2024

For some reason I couldn't stop thinking about my dear friend, the dead cowboy and great reporter, Harold "The Stranger" Lynch. Happy Trails.

As I was thinking about Harold Lynch today, I decided to rescue a column I wrote about him and his death in the old Nashville Banner.  With permission, Rob Dollar and I reprinted it in our newspaper classic, "When Newspapers Mattered: The News Brothers & their Shades of Glory," available on amazon. Here's that column:  



Nashville Banner, Opinion Page (July 30, 1990): Fond farewell to the old cowboy

The old cowboy looked across the Formica table. A pink/white smile—punctuated by down-tilted stress lines—lighted his pasty face

He forked a bit of lemon pie, washed it down with coffee.

“I’ve got no regrets,” he allowed. “Lived life the way I wanted to.

“I mean there are some things I wish I’d done differently. But, you know, I’ve had a helluva good life.”

Harold Lynch’s laughter turned to breath-labored gagging.

“So, how’ve you been?” he asked.

It was typical of the old cowboy to wonder about me when his own life was drawing to an end.

Harold was no saint. You can ask his grieving wife and the two kids.

He was a kind human being. That’s plenty.

Harold didn’t look much like the cowboy of our respective youths the last time we “rode the range” together over pie and coffee at Shoney’s in Green Hills.

He was pale, weary. A cowboy riding a hospital bed doesn’t get much sun.

“You’re looking good,” he said.

I couldn’t return the compliment. I wouldn’t lie to him. Never have. I should say never did.

He died the other day. He was only 43.

The long battle with lung cancer ended the way he said it would.

“I don’t’ know much about this stuff,” he said, as we galloped the range of memories. “Sometimes it’s not worth fighting.

“But the doctor told me that the only good thing about it is that when I want to call it quits, I can.”

Monday night, Harold told the doctors to turn off the life-support machinery.

I can imagine that in his heart he was smiling. He had control over one final act. He died Tuesday night.

Harold was one of the stalwarts of my former place of employment, The Leaf-Chronicle in Clarksville.

Actually, he was in his second tenure there.  He left Clarksville 20 years ago to work at the Nashville Banner. After stints on the state and outdoors beats here, he moved back to the Clarksville paper.

All “News Brothers” drank too much when we were younger.  Harold drank more than any reporter I ever knew. He kept it up when we moved on.

A beer in one hand, Marlboro bobbing beneath the mustache, the old cowboy drawled us through rodeo adventures into endless neon nights.

A Stetson and boots covered both ends of his lanky, arthritis-gnarled frame. All were souvenirs of his bareback-riding days.

He changed out of the cowboy duds for good the last time he overcame a deadly obstacle, when he returned the last case of “dead soldier” Sterlings for deposit, when he rediscovered joys of loving family and sobriety.

Yet, he remained the old cowboy in my heart.

With the beer well in his past, a more upbeat Harold greeted the world.

He’d talk with relish about the war he’d won, enemy hops undone.

A year or so ago, doctors told the old cowboy he had cancer in one lung. “Well, take it out,” he commanded.

They did.  He thought he had it beat, that the remaining lung would be healthy. One more enemy vanquished.

He talked about vacations with his kids, wife and old friends.

“I want to take you to my favorite fishing spot,” he allowed to a riding buddy.

A few months ago, the cancer returned for a final shootout.

The old cowboy didn’t give up.

And, to the credit of the newspaper in Clarksville, they didn’t give up on him either. He returned to work whenever he could.

Scarcely audible, he still commanded authority, respect, love.

He was planning on returning to work right up until he had them pull the plug.

The last time the old cowboy and I rode the range, we watched the afternoon sun’s angle splash color across the Formica table.

We laughed a bit. I cried inside, until he saw the tears behind my eyes. “Take it easy,” he smiled.

Then I understood. He had called to suggest we “have coffee” that day because he wanted to say goodbye.

When the waitress brought the check, the old cowboy tried to rope it in with his thin, near-bloodless hands.

“I’ll get it this time,” I said, rustling the check away. “You get it next time.”

He didn’t protest. He simply nodded.

We both knew there wouldn’t be a next time, that the old cowboy would ride into the sunset owing me a pie wedge, a cup of coffee.

We walked slowly to the parking lot and I grabbed his arm and hand.

“Don’t worry about me,” Harold said. “It’s good to see you again.”

A few years ago, he would have tipped his Stetson.

 

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