tales of greg's life >>
Submitted by Mark Congiusta
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
I was lucky enough to grow up in a time before the PlayStations and X-Boxes of the world enslaved the flower of youth with their flickering lights, booming soundtracks and tawdry visuals. In my day, we played outside. Roaming the streets of our Brooklyn neighborhood from dawn to dusk - and often well beyond - the prospect of a day spent indoors was more punishment than promise. We had friends then who's houses we went to and who's doorbells we rang in hopeful anticipation of getting a large enough crowd together to start some type of game outside, in the street, where city children were meant to play. It was here that I first met Greg Saucedo. Even back then Greg was the life of the party. Always with the best jokes. Always the loudest, most infectious laugh. Always a smile.
One of the most indelible memories that I have of Greg in our youth did not come back to me until after September 11, 2001 and I found out the sad news that Greg was among the thousands that were lost that day that the world changed. Initially, I searched my consciousness for something about Greg that I could cherish, but at that time, my numbness would allow me little more than a picture of Greg in my mind's eye. One day, about a week later, after I had returned to work a few blocks west of Ladder 5 where Greg last worked, I sat at my desk and this story came to me. It is not particularly noteworthy or humorous and may mean more to me than to anyone else, but it is poignant, so I share it here.
We were all about barely pubescent pre-teens one summer on East 57th Street when it was decided that we were all going to travel the two blocks up to Avenue N and each purchase the exact same blue pea-cap from the Army-Navy store that was there once upon a time. These hats would unify us at least, and at best, warn neighboring blocks that the wearer of said hat was a citizen of E 57th Street and was not to be messed with - for obvious reasons. Anyway, money was begged from parents and cash reserves were raided in bedrooms up and down the block so that the hats could be purchased. Speaking for myself, you could not have convinced me that we were not the coolest bunch of 11-13 year olds in all of NYC. In the following days one would not dare leave his house without his cap any more than one would consider leaving his house sans clothes. We were, to put it mildly, the shit. Or so we thought.
One night we were sitting around, lounging on some parked cars basically trying to look exceedingly cool, in our hats of course, when we noticed Greg walking down the middle of the street towards us, coming from the direction of his house. The first thing I noticed was that Greg was not wearing his hat. I could not imagine why. We all looked in his direction as he approached us wearing a very serious look on his face. Greg got within about 20 feet of where we were all sitting and dramatically stopped. He cocked his head to the side and raised his right ear to the air as if straining to hear a distant sound. Suddenly a look of surprise came over Greg's face immediately followed by one of threatening determination. Greg looked directly at us and yelled "My friends! They need me!" At which time Greg reached into his back pocket producing his missing hat, placed it squarely on his head and turned around running off in the direction where his imperiled friends waited for him to come and save the day. We all fell apart laughing. Greg came back, smiling broadly, pleased with himself that his plan worked and he achieved his goal of making everyone laugh. Needless to say that this scene was repeated several times over the course of this warm summer's evening, each time met with howls of laughter no less sincere than the first outburst. That was also, the last night any of us ever wore our matching hats.
Greg's genius lay not in his ability to make people laugh, but in his ability to embrace the absurdity of life and expose it for all to see, forcing you to stop taking things so seriously and causing you to open up and express true and profound joy now that that you too could appreciate the burlesque of life. In this one instant he showed us how pompous we were being with our stupid hats, but he did not do it with ridicule, he did it by showing us the fallacy of our logic. Kids + Hats does not equal Cool. And Greg showed us that as only Greg could.
Years later, as it turns out, Greg's friends really did need him. So did his city, his country and his fellow citizens - total strangers. Again, Greg did not hesitate to answer the call, but unfortunately, this time, the stakes were much, much higher...
Greg, you are greatly missed, although we are all better people for having known you. While memories are all we have, they are not nearly enough. Thanks for the laughter...