Printer and I were never in close proximity. He would be in Scobey and I in Helena. He would
be in Missoula, I, in New York or Baltimore. I would be marching down Fifth Avenue
protesting the Vietnam War, he, half a world away in the middle of it. God knows we were
close chronologically, a couple of Leo’s born the same week in 1941, four months before Pearl
Harbor.

We were also close as friends, and our friendship was like a conversation whose themes
carried over from one year to the next. We would not converse for months, even a year or
two, but then one of us would call the other, or we would have a rare get-together, and we
would take up where we had left off. That’s one of the hallmarks of friendship.

In our younger years and into our teens, the Helena Bowlers had an annual Easter ritual. We
would climb in the car Good Friday morning and drive all day across the Hi-Line to Scobey,
where Grandma Bowler would be waiting with a well-done (putting it mildly) roast beef
dinner and Printer would be waiting with Easter weekend plans./ As we approached and
entered our teens, those plans often involved girls. We double-dated and necked in the back
row of the Rex and one year in the back and front seat of Uncle Larry’s Chevy, which we had
taken without permission and had driven to a spot Printer knew about 3 miles from town. In
those days, as now, as a matter of fact, you didn’t need a key to start certain Chevy models;
you just turned a switch. Well, of course we had a flat and couldn’t get in the trunk for the
spare/ Printer’s solution was for me to walk to town while he protected the girls, get the keys
from Larry and catch a ride back with my parents. When I got to town, Uncle Larry was not
amused, nor was my dad. They conferred, Larry handed me the keys and said, “Have a nice
walk!”

Later, in high school, Printer and I were selected by our principals for Boys State, a week-long
civics exercise on the campus of Western Montana College in Dillon/. A culminating event
was an election replicating the forthcoming Montana general election. Printer and I decided
to run for the two open associate justice seats. When it came time for the required
nominating speeches, we nominated each other. We campaigned together, recalling our
Grandpa Burley stumping for Sen. Zales Ecton a few years before. We worked up a couple of
banners urging “Both Bowlers.” But alas, both Bowlers were trounced, Printer by a wider
margin than I. (Scobey has never been a big power in Montana politics.) Senator Ecton, by the
way, lost narrowly in 1952 to a University of Montana professor named Mike Mansfield.

Printer and I turned 30 in the summer of 1971. Margaret and I had just moved to Baltimore
and barely had a pot to piss in, so I came alone to the joint wedding of two of Printer’s
sisters. Printer arrived with a present he divided equally among the newlywed couples and
me. Late the night of the wedding we lay in the grass behind the house and smoked Printer’s
gift. I’ll never forget how bright the stars were! You could almost grab them in the sky! There
is no urban light in Scobey, Montana to dull the firmament.

Printer and I did not share a fascination with golf (although his writing about it increased my
understanding), but we did share one dark shadow – the terrible tragedy of Vietnam/. That’s
one of the conversations we returned to many times over our years of friendship. We
experienced the war in entirely different ways, but both of us came away embittered, our
lives changed forever. Printer’s letter to Newsweek some years ago was a masterpiece of
insight (and brevity). I hope someone saved it. I, stupidly, did not.

Finally, a word to Kim. I called her a couple of weeks ago. She had just returned from
Bozeman, where she had witnessed the birth of a grandbaby. She was literally breathless
with joy. I could feel it over the phone. My book club had been reading “Man Seeks God,” in
which the author, Eric Weiner, has eight deep religious experiences all over the world. (It’s a
good read, partly because Weiner is a journalist with a great sense of humor – like Printer.) It
happened that Weiner was dabbling at the moment in Tao, the Chinese religion, one of
whose mottos is this:

“Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from different sides.”

Thank you, and thank you for a wonderful life, Printer.