31 years ago this week my best friend died from a drug OD in San Francisco. [View All]

[ohiosmith]

I had known and been friends with Carlos since grade seven. His family was from Bogota, Columbia and his dad was the Dean of romance languages at Ohio State University. Carlos was a brilliant student and artist. He spoke a more than a dozen languages and numerous dialects.

He and I had a falling out in 1967 and we lost contact.

In 1989 I tracked down one of his brothers while visiting Ohio. Kiko shared with me that Carlos had developed a serious drug problem in the late 60s and dropped out of university. He moved to San Francisco in the early 70s and after several attempts got straight. He married the daughter of a Spanish diplomat and they had a little girl.

In 1976 both of his legs were crushed in an auto accident. During his recovery he was on a morphine drip.

The first week of November 1976 his wife held a belated birthday party for him. He was still on pain killers from the accident and was warned by his doctor not to mix his meds with alcohol. He ignored the warning and drank some wine.

Feeling ill he left the party and went to bed.

When his wife checked on him later that evening his was not breathing. Emergency response could not revive him and he was pronounced DOA. The Coroner's finding was a an unintentional drug overdose.

His wife blamed herself for allowing him to have the wine and committed suicide six months later.

Their child was taken to live in Spain with the wife's family.

RIP Charlie Brown. I miss you man.