Cowboy Willie’s Buckaroos

JT Twissel

When I first met Pete Crosby it was hard for me to imagine him ever biking from Ventura California to Refugio Beach (68 miles) with Cowboy Willie to spend the night in a cow pasture. Even as a fifteen year old, self-described poor boy. The Pete I met was a successful Southern California businessman, casually though elegantly dressed, holding court with other prominent Cal and Stanford alumni in the private backroom of a funky seafood restaurant in Berkeley. But once he and the Cowboy started recanting their childhood adventures and their heady days in high school as the “Big Six” – well, everyone buckled in and prepared to be amused.

Pete Crosby in high school probably in his dad’s pharmacy

That was at least twenty-five years ago but already they’d had a lifetime together. True, their paths diverged wildly. Pete blamed the hippie movement for the death of his only brother and Cowboy Willie protested with the Black Panthers. But Pete was the sort of guy to always keep the old gang together no matter what.

Cowboy Willie took his passing hard.

But, he took Buckaroo Wayne’s passing even harder. “I loved that guy,” he said. And then he said no more.

Wayne at an AIDS March probably 1994. He’s giving Cowboy Willie the old “you don’t say” look which probably proceeded a snarky retort. The two buckaroos spent a lot of time far from home trying to get computer systems up and running. And then they’d blow their expense accounts on wine and beer while debating things like “quarks.”

Nothing we can do. Old friends leave and we go on. But there should be a law: No more than one buckaroo should be allowed to pass every year.

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