The Justice

The name game usually has two possible outcomes, neither of which is particularly exciting. Still, having studied abroad for nearly five months in Seville, I have seen it played out countless times. Two people meet for the first time, and say where they are from and where they go to school. Inevitably each person has some connection to the other one's home or college. After saying you know someone from a certain school or area, you throw the name out there and the recipient either says, "Sure, I know him," or much more likely says, "Sorry, never heard of him." This is why I rarely bother. But for some reason when Bobby Winston introduced himself and told me he was from New Orleans, I couldn't help myself.

I told him that I knew one person from New Orleans: Bernard Herman. Instead of the typical blasé reaction, Bobby stumbled backwards as if propelled by joy. His two hands clutched his mane of hair as he dipped down towards the ground and let out a thunderous laugh. For a second I thought he would fall into the nearby river.

"No way you know that kid!" he said. "I've known Bernard since kindergarten! He is the man!"

Giddy with excitement, we talked about the different contexts in which we knew him. For me, Bernard was the star writer of the Justice features section: The reporter I could always count on to keep the section afloat with his witty and articulate writing, a walking thesaurus and an interested observer. He was the staff member who would always endearingly disrupt the section meetings with his hilarious wisecracks. For Bobby, Bernard was the guy he used to make movies with, the thirteen-year-old who had his bar mitzvah party at the local Chinese restaurant, the fan who would charge the court after a basketball victory to tackle Bobby and pound his chest in celebration, the speaker who had everyone in stitches with his graduation speech (including John Goodman, whose daughter was graduating): Bernard was there for everything.

We parted ways for the night, and I went to bed in a good mood. Two days later, I found out that Bernard had passed away. The first thing I did was get in touch with Bobby, to see how he was taking the news. The next night, we went out and exchanged more stories to honor his memory. We talked about how strange it was that we had only met days earlier and how in a way it was Bernard who brought us together. Describing Bernard in full would be a monumental task; the only person I have known with the sufficient vocabulary needed to do so was Bernard himself.

Still, Bobby said one thing that night that really hit the mark. "You know," Bobby said, "Bernard really would have gotten a kick out of knowing that the two of us were hanging out in Spain. That's the thing about Bernard, no matter where he was, he always had a way of bringing people together."

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