What can one say about Fred Henzer? Fred was a man of some contradictions. The very first time I ever met him, back in high school (it seems eons ago), he tried to beat the living daylights out of me because I had mistaken him for a particular enemy of his. Luckily for me he was restrained by his friends (indeed, my friends) who vouched for me and urged him to forget such an innocent error. I didn’t think much of him and made a mental note not to get involved with such a character. But of course it was hard not to come across Fred often if you were born in 1984 and hung around Bronxville. Our introductory incident was quickly forgotten and we soon became friends (though admittedly never close), mostly because we had friends in common.

Fred was charming without being a cad. It was no doubt why and how, despite his many flaws, he managed in those days to have a girlfriend as pretty and immediately endearing as Alana (who flew across the country to attend his funeral today — her birthday). And while his friends were his friends (and indeed being his friend was something that mattered to Fred), he did have his enemies as well — more out of pride and anger, I think, than out of a genuine hate.

He was an inveterate moocher. Of course the man whom he mooched off of the most was Frank Powers. Frank, without a doubt the most respected and admired man of those our age in Westchester, was probably the best friend he ever had, but as Frank said when once asked of Fred, there’s only so much you can do for a friend.

Fred found some of the slight restrictions the rest of us take for granted quite irritating, and sometimes he in turn became an irritation to others because of it. I remember once driving back from some party or gathering at 2:00 in the morning when we stopped at a red light. Sitting in the passenger seat, he found the red light unbearable and begged me to pass through it, there was no one behind us, nor in front of us, not a single car in sight, he pleaded. No one would notice, it wouldn’t hurt a fly, just run this light! But I was as stubborn as he, and it was not long before it turned green anyhow and he shut up.

But his flaws were always excused, weren’t they? He was Fred after all. In hindsight, there is an obvious and quick temptation to call ourselves to account for his ultimate downfall. Could we have done more for him? Were we too tolerant? Too forgiving? Couldn’t we have somehow intervened? I doubt it. Fred was his own master. He made his own decisions; he made good ones and he made poor ones, but they were his. As Frank (who would know more than anyone else) said, there’s only so much you can do.

His end did not come as a surprise to those who knew him, but this does not negate the tragedy of his death, and indeed his life. We must restrain ourselves from romanticizing the life and death of an addict. It was undignified. Fred was a human being — a son, a brother, a friend — he deserved better. It is saddening that someone as vivacious and lively and indeed loving as Fred did not have enough of that most necessary love, the love of life, to keep himself in order and his bad habits in check.

What has he left us in this world? Bits of laughter and hilarity, some very amusing times, moments of lightness and indeed even wit, too many to even attempt to record here. These may sound like light and ephemeral things, but there was an underlying goodness to Fred that animated them, and it is that underlying goodness that I hope we will all recall in years to come when our minds turn back to the man we used to know, Fred Henzer.

We will remember him.