rymijo

a friend of mine passed away yesterday. i found out second-hand, from my father, who saw the obituary in the paper.

he wasn't a close friend--we were pretty good friends our freshman year of high school but drifted apart in later years when we no longer had classes together.

his name was erik.

erik j. roell.

the last time i remember seeing erik was at best buy where he worked. i wasn't sure if it was him at first. i hadn't seen him in so long and i didn't know that he worked there. when i realized that it probably was him, i tried not to make eye-contact. not because i didn't want to talk to him. i would have loved to talk to him. we were both just so painfully shy, it would have been awkward and i have a tendency to avoid awkward situations at all costs--even when i have no real reason to and that it might (as it definitely did in this case) come back to bite me in the ass.

i do regret not talking to him this final time (i feel like such a coward for letting something so trivial get in the way of not even at least attempting to say "hi") but i also regret not continuing our friendship throughout high school to the present. it's sort of a cliche: anytime someone dies, you always hear people say things like "i wish i'd done this" or "i wish i'd done that" but the fact that it may be an unoriginal sentiment does nothing to lessen my regret.

i was in history class with erik once. our teacher was giving a lecture. we were supposed to be taking notes. out of nowhere, i received an anonymous note, the corner of a notebook page ripped off and folded once with no addressee. i looked at the girl in front of me incredulously. "for me?" i asked. she nodded. i opened it up and knew right away who it was from. i could tell by the handwriting. also: because of what it said. it was from erik. scrawled on the inside was an inside joke that would be near impossible to make funny or communicate in writing. i looked up from where i was seated and saw erik in the front row with a wry smile on his face. i burst out laughing. at which point, erik quickly looked back down at his notes, straight-faced and denying by his stoic composure any involvement with the note or the subsequent disturbance. everyone immediately swiveled around in their seats to look at me, trying to figure out why i was laughing. our teacher looked me dead in the eyes and asked if everything was alright. he had no idea erik was involved even though erik was a mere two feet away from him. i said that i was fine, red-faced and trying to regain my composure while erik somehow miraculously seemed unfazed by the event except to turn around after all the commotion had settled and smile at me in a "haha-got-you" sort of way.

these are the sort of gags erik liked to pull on people and one quality that i've always tried to emulate and search for in others (though i've never met anyone who could do it quite like erik--he had such a distinctive sense of humor).

i'll continue this later...

he knew the claims were bogus. he knew they were bogus when he and his "market research" team for which he served as head made them up. the idea was that:
a. the consumer is gullible/stupid (a fair assessment for anyone to make)
and that
b. they were prone to if not unusually eager to believe any claim which promised them better overall health
and also that
c. they would buy any product claiming to improve their health or at least one aspect (not matter how inconsequential) of their health

he also knew that FDA regulations on such claims were light and that they allowed him to make such outrageous claims as:

"the cure for cancer"
or
"the anecdote for AIDs"

as long as an asterisk was provided along with a vague explanation at the bottom of the box or, his favorite place to hide them, inside the box, in faded print that was barely discernible against the flacks and speckles of cardboard, asserting that, at least in one case, there was substantial evidence (even if it was anecdotal) to support these claims despite there being no real scientific correlation between the two. as long as he did these things--which were no sweat off his back at all--he was in the clear and could invent these ridiculous fabrications to his snide little heart's content.

the AIDs claim came from a professor at some obscure university he more or less paid to say that the product cured AIDs. this way: the quote was authentic, if not incredibly fallacious and misleading, and passed all the breezy requisites set forth by the FDA. no, it did not actually cure AIDs, but someone at a university (and therefore credible--at least in the public eye) did say that and that was enough to convince anyone.

naturally: people were skeptical but they bought the products by the boat full. even if they didn't have any of the ailments advertised as curable by the product on the box, they figured it was at least a good precautionary measure in the event that they did develop them one day or become infected with them so that the product became somewhat of a sensation as a cure-all vaccine, touted in the media and colloquially as the next proverbial apple--for which it's said the doctor is kept away by daily consumption, making the apple a doctor's biggest threat to business and least prescribed treatment.

one day: at a conference celebrating a very unhealthy snack bar which the man and his research team decided could cure lupus, the man was confronted by an actual lupus patient who had stopped taking his medication in lieu of three daily doses of the snack bar, also replacing all the man's meals. he swore that the product was effective and he wasn't being facetious, either. he legitimately believed the snack bar--pumped so full of trans fat and virtually no redeeming nutritional perks--actually improved his overall health and condition. this was a conviction of his.

the snack bar was called "loopies" in reference to the sickness it promised to cure.