Outgoing and cocky. Adventurous, yet relaxed. This, in his own words, was Ronald Goldman.
He was more than just a waiter. More than just Nicole Brown Simpson's friend. More than just a name in a headline.After moving to Los Angeles from suburban Chicago at age 18, Goldman basked in the Southern California lifestyle, learning to surf, becoming a health club regular, playing softball on Sundays, hanging out at coffee shops by day and hitting trendy spots by night.
"He was always having fun," says longtime friend Mike Pincus. "He lived day-to-day."
On the July weekend that would have marked his 26th birthday, his friends gathered at a Santa Monica nightclub and held a party for him.
"They actually brought out a cake," said Philip Cummins, co-owner of Renaissance. There were "50 guys crying their eyes out."
The tearful gathering is testimony to the affable nature that was indicative of Goldman - a smooth-talking, golden-skinned waiter who boosted his income as a club promoter and occasionally as a model.
A picture of a handsome, bespectacled Goldman is still featured in a fashion ad in a local Cheesecake Factory menu.
Symbolic of his attitude was an appearance on the risque TV dating show "Studs," for which Goldman wrote the description of his personality in 1991: "`Outgoing, cocky, adventurous, relaxed and athletic."
After dropping out of college, Goldman lived with his family in suburban Agoura Hills and held a string of jobs waiting tables, hoping to gain enough experience so he could open his own restaurant, said his father, Fred Goldman.
"That's why he had jobs at restaurants. He was getting a handle on what it took," his father said. "He was putting his life together."
Goldman's drawback, if any, was a penchant for the nicer things in life - a desire that led him to overuse his credit cards so much that he filed for bankruptcy in 1992, claiming $12,216.97 in liabilities.
The suburban life soon proved too inhibiting, and Goldman set his sights on Brentwood, a fashionable Westside area where he could hobnob with the rich and famous.
Goldman, however, had little money and no car. He moved to one of the few streets lined with modest apartment buildings, many inhabited by students attending the nearby University of California, Los Angeles. His good looks and his connections in the community often got him into the hottest clubs for free.
At times, he shared his one-bedroom apartment with Jacqui Bell, a clothing boutique worker who ended their on-again, off-again relationship but still held out the hope that someday they might marry.
In Brentwood, Goldman found himself surrounded by a clique of well-toned, youthful bodies who hung out at a Starbucks coffee shop that sits on a bustling boulevard, across from the Mezzaluna restaurant where Goldman worked and Nicole Brown Simpson often dined.
It was at Starbucks, friends say, where Goldman and Nicole Simpson first met, several months before their lives came to a savage end on the pathway of her condo. She often stopped at the coffee shop after a run around town, sometimes with her Akita dog in tow.
Goldman and Nicole Simpson became friends, working out at a pricey gym, driving around in her white Ferrari and hanging out on Thursday nights at Renaissance, where Nicole Simpson usually went with her girlfriends.
The friendship ultimately cost Goldman his life when he offered to return a pair of glasses Nicole Simpson's mother had left at Mezzaluna, where her family had dined that night. It was an errand his friends say was entirely in character.
"He would open his heart to anyone," Pincus says. "You'd ask him for a favor and he would do it."