During the summer of 2008, my good friends, Josh and Sarah, got married in Hawaii amongst an intimate gathering of immediate family. They renewed their vows in late December with a beautiful, romantic, slightly belated wedding reception. I was one of two Best Men to speak that night.

While common wisdom would suggest that the best way to deliver a toast is to speak extemporaneously and directly from the heart, I took the exact opposite approach and drafted a script that I intended to memorize and deliver. I was so honored that Josh had entrusted me to say something meaningful and to help set the right tone for the night. I prepared as much as I could in order to reciprocate that honor to Josh.

Being one of the Best Men at Josh’s wedding was an experience that I will always remember with great fondness. I’m so glad I was a Best Man at least once in my life, but once is frankly enough. I was a nervous wreck two weeks prior to the wedding reception. I’m a writer, not a an orator.

Special props go out to the other Best Man, Carlos Oliveira, for his support and encouragement while I was on the brink of hyperventilation during the minutes leading up to my speech. I’d also like to mention Conrado Oliveira, who started clapping and chanting “KZ” to help me through that awkward pause when I forgot my next line. This act came from a place of love, and I won’t soon forget it. Special thanks go out to Tommy for heckling me from the guest tables as I was setting up one of my jokes. It’s all love, Tommy, I know. Wiseguy. Finally, thank you to my wonderful girlfriend, Diana, whom I love deeply, and whose loving support gave me the courage to believe that I could do the speech my way, and succeed in doing so.

If you’ll please forgive me this indulgence, I have posted below the original script of my Best Man’s speech.

The Other Best Man – by KZ

Believe it or not, ladies and gentlemen, I am the other Best Man. We’re kind of doing the People Magazine thing where they name the sexiest man alive every year, but oddly enough, every year it’s always a different dude. It kind of cheapens the honor, don’t you think? Well, whatever, there’s two best men now, and one indecisive groom. The way Josh explained it to us, he couldn’t decide between me or Carlos, so he decided to honor us both as his Best Men. That’s a cute explanation, but if you really want to know the truth, I just think Josh has problems with commitment.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re sitting there in your chair, folding your arms and thinking to yourself, “Oi! How can you say such a terrible thing at the bloke’s wedding reception?” First of all, please drop the terrible cockney English accent because it is not working for you. But secondly, relax. I emailed this very speech to Josh this afternoon at 2 PM. I assume since he never got back to me with a reply or a complaint, that everything I’m doing up here is fully sanctioned by Josh.

Having said that, I would like to read a poem I wrote specifically for this occasion. I wasn’t sure whether I should read this poem tonight. I’ll try to keep it short, but it’s about seven…seven…seventeen pages long. But again, Josh gave me his “silent OK”, so anything goes. Four letter words and all. And…it’s in my other tux. Thank you very much Diana for reminding me on the way out of the house today. Let’s give her a round of applause, ladies and gentlemen. She has ruined my entire speech.

At this point, Josh probably hates me, and he’s regretting that he ever asked me to come up here and say something nice about him.

Truth be told, Josh and I have known each other for twenty years now, and we have never been able to get rid of each other. We met at the age of seven at Five Wounds Elementary School. Then we went on to Bellarmine College Prep for high school. Then finally, for undergrad, we both ended up going to Santa Clara University. We’ve remained friends long after graduation. For twenty years, I’ve had the privilege of calling Josh my friend. And for the past four years, I’ve had the delight of getting to know Sarah, and I now consider her one of my closest friends. It makes my heart sing to know that these two have found so much happiness together. After twenty years of friendship, I am proud to witness these moments, the time in my good friend’s life when he starts a new life with his wonderful bride. Josh has gotten married before I have, by the way, and my girlfriend Diana won’t let me hear the end of it. “Oi! Josh and Sarah did it. When are you and me getting married?” Diana’s English accent is terrible. Why does she talk to me like that? She’s not even British.

I’ve been thinking a lot this week about love, and what I can say about it without sounding redundant. What can you really say about love that hasn’t been said literally thousands of times before? What more can I say when so many inspired philosophers, authors, poets, and playwrights have already weighed in on the subject with far more eloquence than I’m capable of? Just as humankind has always done for centuries, we are born, we grow, we learn, and we fade away. But in between, there are some beautiful moments where, with a little luck, we find love, we get married, and we celebrate with grand parties just like this one. It’s happened billions of times before throughout the ages, and I should think that it will happen billions of times more in the future. When you begin thinking of anything on that grand a scale, you begin to wonder, “So what?” Love? It’s all been done before, so what’s all the fuss about? What a tidy little rut we find ourselves in.

But love is no rut, not in any form. Love is the grand experiment of life that constantly surprises us by joy, one generation after the next, and always with the same old bag of tricks. The human dance wouldn’t be the same without love to guide us with all of its familiar refrains. Robert Frost once said, “Love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired.” That innate desire lives inside all of us, and it begs us to dream, challenges us to grow, and dares us to care about someone other than ourselves. Love is that immutable constant of the human spirit that invariably keeps us all human. Love is our guarantee that the human spirit, for all of its frailties, will always have something worth celebrating. Tonight, my human spirit soars with gratitude and joy because two people whom I love very much have dedicated their lives to loving each other. I can think of no better reason to celebrate.

Tonight, my friends, let’s all raise our glasses in celebration to Josh and Sarah.

Posted by KZ on 12/22/08

A few years back, from 2002 – 2006, I maintained a modest website called SantaBearCam.  It was a novelty website premised on a silly gimmick: on a daily basis, I would post a new picture of my stuffed animal, Santa Bear.  Don’t ask me why, but my friends considered this project more amusing than disturbing, and they offered me support instead of derision.  It’s not every day that you meet a man in his mid-twenties who fixates so shamelessly on his childhood teddy bear.  It’s also not just any friend who would embrace that kind of lunacy and celebrate it without cynicism.

SB was a huge hit.  He was invited to every party and to almost every outing. There’s something oddly liberating about hugging a teddy bear in public, and I think my friends understood that.  So I dragged my stuffed bear to places where he never expected to go, and my friends enthusiastically posed for pictures with SB — stuffing drinks in his face, making goofy faces, and dreaming up preposterous poses, all for the benefit of SantaBearCam.

And just like that, I became the de facto historian for my circle of friends.  In the days before the popularity of Flickr, Photobucket, and convenient photo sharing through those social networking sites, I was documenting the happiest times of our shared experiences and logging the chronology with Santa Bear’s galleries.

Time went on, as it does, and the landscape began to change.  Some of us moved away to cities barely within driving distance of the rest of us.  Some of us left the state entirely.  Some of us ended our relationships on bad terms.  Some of us bickered and ended long-standing friendships over trivialities.  So it goes.  There are some things in life that not even the unifying force of Santa Bear’s grin can change.

Quietly and unceremoniously, SantaBearCam faded away.  I have all of the site’s data stored locally on my computer hard drive, and I click through it on occasion with great fondness.  Santa Bear may have been the focal point of the project, but I had always seen the website as a celebration of friendship.  I look back at the countless smiles, the echoes of laughter, the couples who once were, the friends who had yet to part ways, and my heart aches to think of the possibilities that gave way to stubborn improbabilities.

My circle of friends still remains.  Our ranks have thinned and replenished over time, and the air feels different now, which actually isn’t such a bad thing.  Even so, sometimes I feel myself longing for the days when friendship seemed like a much simpler thing.

Posted by KZ on 09/29/08

I’ve never been fond of final goodbyes. Everybody always insists on brightening their parting words with lofty optimism and half-hearted promises. It’s a ritualized dance of mutually understood pretense that facilitates graceful exits. To acknowledge the truth is to create opportunities for awkward guilt and self-reflection. And so we lie to our departing friends, and we lie to ourselves within those final effusive moments. “Let’s keep in touch,” we always say. “We have each other’s information, so don’t be a stranger.” More often than we’d like, though, the memories of our departing friends are fated to fade and to slowly reform themselves into unfamiliar shapes.

One of the sad truths about friendship is that proximity often defines it. While humans can be loyal and communal creatures at best, there’s no getting around the fact that our minds and our hearts perceive the world through crude, imperfect increments of measurement, like distance and time. A friendship is a fairly simple thing to maintain when your friend plays a role in your daily, weekly, or even monthly routine. But if one of you should ever pick up and move halfway across the country, you’ll eventually notice your mutual affections tilting on a gradual decline. It’s an inadvertent kind of slip, which somehow excuses the callous inclination to live on and forget.

There’s no use taking it all too personally, though. The hardness of the world has conditioned us all to become emotional mercenaries. We’ll love passionately, listen attentively, and care with all sincerity, just so long as our lovers and friends reside within driving distance. We spend our entire lives in transit between one uncomfortable context after another. Consequently, we’ve developed this urgent desire to seek out relief at every opportunity. And so we’ve devised clever devices like ergonomic chairs, easy-grip handlebars, rubber and foam wrist supports, and, of course, convenient relationships. We’re only human, I guess.

No, I don’t honestly believe that every long-distance relationship is doomed to failure. I do have to wonder, though, why we allow such a trivial thing like distance to end so many of our friendships. Every relationship hinges on common ground, whether it’s common interests, common sensibilities, or merely common affections. When distance suddenly divides you from a loved one, the common ground that brought you together doesn’t magically disappear. So why should distance matter? We all know it shouldn’t. But ultimately, we all know it does.

And yet we lie to each other’s faces during our final goodbyes, pretending as if we’re above such corporeal contrivances like distance and time. And that, my friends, is why I’m not a fan of final goodbyes. We’ve reduced our parting words to the caliber of soulless, disingenuous greeting cards. Real friends don’t tell each other to “keep in touch.” Communication is the sort of thing that’s implied when you find yourself in a genuine friendship. At the end of the road, I prefer sincerity over pretense and tact–a heartfelt hug or a sturdy handshake, and an exchange of stoic words like, “Good luck out there, man. Take care of yourself.” And if I feel like phoning or sending the occasional email sometime afterwards, I’ll make sure to carry through–just the way a real friend should.

Posted by KZ on 12/13/05

Well, a full month has passed since I last checked in. Finals are over, and if you’ll tolerate my tired pessimism, there’s a possibility that my law career could be over as well. My grades weren’t so hot from the first semester, and despite my best efforts over the last five months, I can’t guarantee that I did well enough on my finals to pass. But I’m not here to bum anybody out or to catch pity. I just wanted to let you all know that I’m back, and that my summer vacation has begun.

It’s been gratifying receiving so much support from friends and internet strangers alike. Even random strangers out in the real world have been especially kind to me. A few weeks ago, I was studying for my Property final on the train ride home from school when my car was boarded by a class of eighth graders. They were loud, juvenile, and obnoxiously ebullient. They packed into the cabin and spilled into center aisle. At every stop, their adult chaperone, a man named Mr. Wilson, raised his voice and reminded the students to stand aside and allow people on and off the train. After thirty minutes of hearing him bark his orders, I was starting to like the guy. The train finally reached South Hayward, and the kids started filing out onto the platform. Before Mr. Wilson stepped off, he walked over to my seat, leaned down, and said, “Hey, good luck.” I looked up with a puzzled expression and thanked him. “Property, right?” he asked me. “Yeah,” I responded, hardly able to mask my surprise. Mr. Wilson smiled and walked off the train.

I have no idea how he knew I was a law student, or how he even guessed what I was studying based on my type-written notes. Maybe the man has legal experience himself, and he was able to smell a 1L from 200 yards away. Or maybe the guy just has a remarkable gift for observation. Whatever the case may be, I choose to look back on that exchange as an omen of good fortune. There’s a very real possibility that I didn’t make the academic cut this year. Of course I’m hoping for the best, and of course I can be satisfied in knowing that I gave it my all, but I’m also realistic enough to know that I’ve rarely been the smartest person in the room. But even if this law thing doesn’t work out for me, Mr. Wilson’s words will always hold some meaning. Good luck, kid. Things will be all right. Thank you, Mr. Wilson. Thank you, everybody. I made it through.

Posted by KZ on 05/12/05

Conrado left the following comment for my entry on Saturday, January 17:

!!! You’re the man KZ !!! Remember thataru.

And in response, Francisco had this to say:

This is the end my friends. the last blog entry from kz any of us will read for a long time. Here’s why. you see, our friend josh bought a video game about a month and a half ago. he thought it would be a good idea if i bought it but, i thought it would be better to buy a bunch of booze so i never had enough money. and deep down inside i didn’t want to purchase the game either. conrado bought this game shortly after josh’s purchase and they started playing it together online.

Here’s the point of the story, kz has recently bought the game and i have not seen nor communicated with him since. my three friends have fallen into a world of time-consuming geekiness known as “final fantasy xi.” conrado’s comment is just a brief glimpse of the geeky horror that my dear friends have fallen into. plz, help them if you can.

I just wanted to say that no, I haven’t become a recluse due to Final Fantasy XI…yet. The real reason that I’ve been so hard to find lately is because I’ve been reading The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide by Douglas Adams. I started reading the book in August. But seeing as how I’m a slow reader, coupled with the fact that I had also been dragging my feet on law school applications, it took me until last night to read through all 815 pages of that book. Pretty sad, I know. Maybe I should look into one of those speed reading courses.

Anyway, I dearly loved the book, and I highly recommend it to anybody who isn’t too put off by dry English humor. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll disappear again until I’m struck with another poignant revelation that I feel like recording. For now, I’m off to read shorter books and to level up like crazy in the world of Vana’diel. Fear the mighty TaruTaru!

Posted by KZ on 01/29/04

Well, I did it again. I spent another late night chilling with friends when what I should have been doing was finishing my law school applications. I’m already two weeks past my personal deadline, after all. But hell, you know what? I honestly believe that there was no better way to spend my time tonight.

Sometimes living for the present isn’t as simple as only thinking about today or about what’s coming within the next few weeks. Sometimes living for the present compels you to confront the “far,” uncertain future and all of the hard times that it has in store for you. At this particular instance in my life, during a time that most would still consider to be my “early years,” I choose to think about death. It’s the one wrong turn that we all see coming from miles away, and yet it never fails to break your heart when somebody in your life finally rounds that corner. Freaking mortality.

Anyway, the thought of death doesn’t occur to me because I’m particularly sad at the moment. Nor, for that matter, does it cross my mind because I’m actively trying to suck the joy out of my own life. No. I contemplate death because it reminds me that now, at this stage in my life, I have as much as I could ever want.

Maybe my friends have noticed something. Maybe they’ve sensed me smiling at them from my silent corner while they carry on. As fun and as vital as we all are when we get together, I can’t help but think that one day, we’ll all be gone. And though my heart stings slightly from the thought of losing any of those guys, I know that there’s little good in mourning prematurely. So my heart swells, and I’m filled with warmth and an irrepressible joy for having ever found friends that make me laugh as hard and who make me feel as loved. Mind you, I’m writing all this without having tasted a single drop of alcohol tonight. I tend to be a weepy drunk, as you might imagine.

I guess all I’m saying is, joy doesn’t have to be an ephemeral thing. It is a condition that you must constantly insist upon in order to have it–even if that means occasionally bumming yourself out with thoughts on the inevitability of loss and suffering. Joy isn’t so bad once you get the hang of it.

Posted by KZ on 01/10/04

Unspecified Male Friend: So, do you want to do her?
Kevin: Nah, it’s not like that. Anyway, she has a boyfriend.
Unspecified Male Friend: So? What does that change?
Kevin: Yeah, I know what you mean. Fine, I guess on some level, sure I do. But really…deep down, don’t all guys wanna do their female friends?
Unspecified Male Friend: No.
Kevin: Oh, then forget I said anything.

Posted by KZ on 12/30/03

Kevin: had i known any of that, i might have driven out anyway
My Friend: but i couldn’t say that to u because i made the call right in front of her
My Friend: so sorry i didn’t give u details
Kevin: it’s cool
Kevin: next time use the code word
My Friend: what code word?
Kevin: croissant affair
Kevin: i’ll ask you, “is this a croissant affair?”
Kevin: and you’ll respond with yes or no
My Friend: lol
Kevin: i know, i could just as easily ask, “is my presence aboslutely necessary?”
Kevin: but “croissant affair” sounds cooler
My Friend: code red?
Kevin: well fine, if you wanna be predictable
Kevin: you can call it code red
Kevin: so we’re doing the colors?
Kevin: red for urgent, yellow for testy, green for neutral?
My Friend: well see it’s a judgment call
My Friend: like last night, it wouldn’t have been like “code red: she’s jumping off a cliff”
My Friend: it’s all too relative
Kevin: i tell you, croissant affair solves it all
My Friend: like last night she was down at that time. would’ve been cool if u could come out, but it wasn’t a huge deal if you didn’t.
Kevin: i see
Kevin: so that would have been a bagel affair
My Friend: lol
Kevin: you follow me?
Kevin: and if everything is all good, and you’re just inviting me out, it’s a fritter affair
My Friend: ok so bagel if u should come out but not necessary. croissant to get your ass out now. and fritter to just plain invite.
Kevin: yeah, so simple
My Friend: lol why a fritter?
Kevin: sounds funnier than a donut affair
Kevin: oooh, what about an eclair affair?
Kevin: that would indicate that YOU’RE down
My Friend: naw if I were down it’d be tub o ice cream affair
Kevin: fine, if you’re down, then call it a scone affair
My Friend: lol
Kevin: okay, it’s settled then. this is all so easy and memorable. =)
My Friend: i’m going to need a corresponding color chart or something
My Friend: i wonder if i can keep my face straight if i ever have to use that code
Kevin: you’d better!
My Friend: lol dude we’re so weird
Kevin: are you mocking the code?
Kevin: do not mock the code!

Posted by KZ on 11/30/03

• 9:00pm: Isaac takes me aside the moment we arrive at The Blue Tattoo and orders us two Alizé and tonics and two Coronas. Being the whipping boys of the night, we toast to “designated drivers” and drink up.
• 10:12pm: Mel is good and liquored up by this time, and he starts in with all his usual antics: walking up to girls on the dance floor and raising both arms to bask in his glory (or whatever the hell that gesture means); calling out things like “I’m rich, I’m single, I’m famous!” or the classic “are you down?” to random chicks passing by; and repeatedly promising to get me and my friends laid by the end of the night. As ever, I’m reminded that even though Mel’s an asshole, and he’s definitely full of shit, I can’t help but love the guy.
• 12:00am: While crossing the outer courtyard of the club with my friends, I make eye contact with a hot Asian chick with that cute, unconceited, girl-next-door look to her. Trailing my friends, I head in her general direction, notice her turn her head to acknowledge me, and I walk right on by because I’m such a goddamn walking pile of insecurities. A pussy, if you will.
• 1:53am: A drunken Carlos approaches the live percussionist who is accompanying the DJ in the trance/techno room. Carlos reaches over and pounds out a great rhythm on the bongos. He and the percussionist start dueling from opposite ends of the drums.
• 2:20am: While eating burritos at Iguana’s, Calvin—the so-called “7th Street Crip,” according to Mel—conspicuously turns around in his seat to check out a girl standing behind him and then takes a picture of her booty with his cell phone.
• 2:45am: From the comfort of my own car, I watch Carlos and Fish drunkenly stumble across Carlos’ driveway and head for the front door. Amused, sober, but still somehow fully satisfied, I back away and drive home.

Posted by KZ on 09/06/03

It’s 5:53 in the morning, and I’m driving a car-full of my drunk friends home. Upon Carlos’ earlier insistence, Pink Floyd is blaring over the speakers. After twenty minutes of being on the road, though, I suddenly get the feeling that I’m the only one that’s digging the music. I look to my right and see Fish in the passenger seat, fast asleep. I take a look over my right shoulder and notice Francisco and Mel, who have both passed out as well. Then I chance a quick look over my left shoulder and check up on Carlos, who has his eyes closed and his head resting against the window. It’s at this surreal moment, at this surreal hour of the early morning, that I somehow nearly convince myself that I’m driving with four stiffs in the car. So I glance over both of my shoulders again–this time more deliberately and theatrical–and I think to myself, “I actually did it. I killed them all.” Lonely car rides home are the best.

Posted by KZ on 08/30/03