Love is one thing and friendship is another but often they go hand in hand. My story, however, is less about love and more about an enduring friendship that lasted some 35 years.

One of six children, I grew up in Adelaide and attended a single sex Catholic boys’ school. In 1973, when I was 13, there was a large influx of new students into Year 8 and one of the new boys was from Melbourne. His father worked for a big supermarket chain, and he had moved his family to Adelaide for five years. While the teenage years can sometimes be fraught and individuals can flounder in a new school environment, Paul was the exception.

At that age the banter was in overdrive and his classmates liked to constantly remind him that not only was he an out-of-towner but a Victorian too! Never fazed, Paul was one of those people who could instantly make friends and he made plenty in a very short time, including me. He had closer friends than me and I had closer friends than him, but he was always there and about: he was the life of the party who had a broad, welcoming smile and an infectious, hearty laugh.

Among his passions at school were water polo, swimming and debating and everything he took on he did so with great zeal and gusto. Paul never did things half-heartedly. Our secondary school years flew by and by 1978 in our last year at school Paul and I were prefects together. Prefects by that time were seen less as disciplinarian figures and more of a friendly bridge between the teacher/student divide.

Soon after finishing school, Paul moved back to Melbourne with his family and I busied myself at a local newspaper after receiving a cadetship in journalism. At the end of 1979, a position became vacant at the Melbourne bureau for the paper I worked with — located at the old Herald Sun building in Flinders Street. I jumped at the chance to work in Melbourne for 12 months and with my parents’ blessing, packed my bags and headed east. While I didn’t know one end of Melbourne from the other, I was very excited by the prospect of living in the big smoke, and I soon found myself a small second floor apartment near Royal Parade in Brunswick.

While quickly making friends with journalists at the Herald, I was also keen to renew my friendship with my old schoolmate, Paul, and within weeks of arriving in Melbourne we arranged to meet. In the following months and with both of us still single 20-year-olds and very keen to find girlfriends, we took to the Melbourne pub scene with great fervor. We even went to the occasional movie together, including a Blues Brothers/Fame double at the Forum Theatre in Flinders Street.

On another occasion we saw a band at a Richmond pub who Paul believed would one day make it big. Later, when he asked me what I thought of Men at Work I just shrugged. Their music seemed alright but to be honest I was more interested in the beer and the girls. Himself a guitar player and with a good ear for music, Paul would end up spending much of his working life in the arts industry and in particular working in theatre management with local councils. He was a real people person, and that industry fitted him like a glove.

My 12-month appointment at the Herald Sun bureau soon extended to two years, then three years and so on. I eventually moved from the Fourth Estate into other journalistic endeavours but was happy to stay put in Melbourne. The eighties came and went and by the mid-1990s, Paul was married with two children and I was married with two children. We were not best friends, but it was the sort of friendship that continued to endure. Even after not seeing one another for two or three years, we could always pick up where we left off. There was always plenty to talk about over a beer or three … and always plenty of laughs, so many laughs. A lasting memory of Paul was his laugh. Even if he told a bad joke, you couldn’t help but join him in a belly shake! One of the few times he didn’t laugh was when the Crows who I supported, knocked off his footy team, St Kilda in the 1997 grand final. He was tremendously passionate about the saints, and he didn’t miss too many of their games during the home and away season. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say the St Kilda colors ran deep in his family’s veins. It took him a while to get his face right after the grand final loss, but it wasn’t in his nature to stay gloomy for long and the laugh and broad smile soon returned.

The next 10 years were dotted with the occasional family get together, but many months would go by without sight or sound between us. In February 2009 my wife and I organised a house party and Paul and his wife Helen were invited, along with many other friends and acquaintances. I didn’t feel much like partying at that stage, as it had only been three weeks since the terrible Black Saturday bushfires that had engulfed parts of Victoria and caused so much death and destruction. I don’t think many of us were in much of a mood to celebrate but the invitations had gone out and the party went ahead. That Saturday night Helen called to say she and Paul unfortunately couldn’t make it because Paul had developed a bad headache. They were on their way to our house when she called on her mobile to cancel. I didn’t take the call, but my wife relayed the message and while disappointed I knew we would catch up down the track. After all, long intervals apart had been a signature of our friendship.

Two nights later another friend, Tony, who was at school with Paul and I in Adelaide rang from Sydney. He and Paul had always been great mates and when I heard his voice down the line, I knew instantly it was bad news. He said Paul had been operated on that day for an aggressive brain tumour but hadn’t survived the surgery. He was 48. Left reeling, the news knocked me like nothing I’d ever experienced. Until that moment I don’t think I’d ever felt real shock and real grief and to this day Tony’s phone call still haunts.

That such a gregarious, fun-loving and warm-hearted person could be taken with so little warning was unbelievably cruel. There wasn’t even time to say goodbye. Everyone who knew and loved Paul was devastated, obviously no more than his lovely wife and two teenage children. Even after almost six years I still can’t help but ask, “Why”? It’s the same question I’m sure his family asks every day. But as we see in the daily news, life can be cruel and seemingly without meaning, as evidenced by the shooting down of the Malaysian plane over the Ukraine with the loss of so many innocent lives. There are times when life is not predictable or fair.

I often think about friends and what makes a friendship work. We all get busy in our lives and can make excuses for not seeing family or friends as often as we perhaps should. But friendship is not about living in someone else’s pockets; friendship is not overbearing; and friendship is not demanding. Friendship is fun, friendship is about respect; and friendship is being there for the other person when it really counts. I still think of the Richmond pub when Paul and I saw Men at Work, the band he predicted would one day make it. Raf, as attribute to my friendship with Paul, and friendships between people everywhere, could you please play, ‘Who Can it Be Now’ by Men at Work.