Robert Burdick

It's not like I hung out with the guy.

Bob was usually found sitting on a milk crate by the loading dock rolling tobacco into paper. Even the mornings I came in at six, he'd be planted there puffing away, raising his hand as I walked past.

Conversation was limited to his chuckling when Gil insulted my cooking, or talking about the Jazz with Thomas Jackson while he sorted the dishes and put them back on the shelves.

He didn't move fast, nor slow. He didn't do a great job, but he was always there, slogging away on a perpetual stack of dishes.

I took the call during a lunch rush. A friend of Bob's said he was sick and wouldn't be in for a few days. I heard later he had pneumonia and was in the hospital. Three days after that Jenny said they'd taken him off life support because Bob had no money or insurance.

That was the end of Robert Burdick.