To An Old Friend,

When I was in my teens there was an older, retired boxer that set up some tables on the side of the rode to create and display these amazing glass statues...

I passed by him on my way to and from karate lessons all the time, and we always talked about boxing vs. karate and the art of fighting. It was great that this retired boxer could create such amazing works of art.

This is a word-math problem that this friend of mine gave to me. Apparently he had given this problem to people from IBM and ewett-Packnerd, and noone was ever able to figure it out. His offer was that he would make a glass ship worth $100 dollars to the first person to figure out the answer.

I was the first person to bring him a correct answer. However, he did not make a $100 glass ship for me. Instead, he gave me a $200 glass ship.

He was a good man, and I will remember the balance our conversations had, and the friendship he showed.

The story behind the story...

The boxer / artist happened to be a black man with an awesome talent for creating glass scruptures. We had a lot of conversations about the realities of fighting. I'm a white guy, by the way. My name is Andrew. This would also be around & before '84' when I was about 15 or 16.

I got the right answer, and I won the $100 glass ship like promised. And like I said, he gave this problem to people from all kinds of computer companies (silicon valley area) and never got an answer back. He really wasn't expecting anyone to answer it, so he didn't exacty have an extra $100 glass ship in stock. These were big projects. I had to wait a while for him to build it. A few days later he offered a ride home. I helped pack things up, and just as I was going to get into the car my older sister showed up. Older by about a decage, to be refered to by me herein as B; B with a capital C. Yaaa, what fun. (Not at all, really.)

She was yelling at me and coming at me from across the street, all while completely ignoring the older boxer not to mention oncoming traffic. All she saw was me about to get into a black guys car, and that's all she needed. Didn't even bother to ask any questions. The original 'Karen'. Over the years she had gained an unnatural foothold in my life. It's actually embarassing how much control she had in some situations. But that embarrasment is a part of it. It's used to prevent doing anything about it. See what I'm talking about here? And it almost always benefitted her agenda, with me needing to thank her for her good intentions.

Anyway, that was the last time I ever saw him parked anywhere on that boulevard (Blossom Hill Road, for anyone familliar with San Jose). So what about the ship? San Jose is a BIG city, and about a year later I ended up in a different part of San Jose looking for the Guitar Center because they were having a sale and I needed an electric guitar. I didn't end up getting the electric guitar, but I did run into him again, and he happened to have the ship with him. Amazing, yes?.

I'm sure he moved because that's the kind of scene B made, and I failed to stand up for him even though I knew better. He was givimg me a ride home because the ship was very delicate and couldn't just be carried. The hull was made of countless tiny loops of glass that almost seemed to break just by looking at it. He was always strait with me, and I had no worries about him. And desipite a couple years of long talks, a clear mutual respect and just never finding any 'red flags' - that I had nothing to worry about... I couldn't even say any of this, or even just to say 'Stop...' long enough to allow some conversion once B started her thing. Like 'Hello' maybe?

This is the first original website I created (back in 2021) and it did included the first part of the text. It's 2025 and as of this 2nd part it is now co-didicated to telling the truth behind what happened, and that this retired boxer was actually a friend. I hope things went better for him after all that. He dsserved better, and I deserved better from... well... B.