Bounce/MrFishist Memorial Service (and Rideshare Thread)
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PurpleKoosh
- Posts: 1638
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- Burning Since: 2003
- Camp Name: M*A*S*H 4207
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She lives with her mom, and I believe that Scott's sister is staying with them this weekend (she flew in from MN for the service), and there have been lots and LOTS of visitors throughout the past month. The house was still full to overflowing when I left.
Anything purple is mine. Anything else can be dyed or painted.
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PurpleKoosh
- Posts: 1638
- Joined: Wed Sep 03, 2003 11:26 pm
- Burning Since: 2003
- Camp Name: M*A*S*H 4207
- Location: Silly Valley, CA
- Contact:
Got my photos uploaded; if anyone has problems viewing them or can fill in names of people I didn't recognize, let me know.
http://pics.livejournal.com/kshandra/gallery/0000bpte
http://pics.livejournal.com/kshandra/gallery/0000bpte
Anything purple is mine. Anything else can be dyed or painted.
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theCryptofishist
- Posts: 40312
- Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2004 9:28 am
- Burning Since: 2017
- Location: In Exile
Thanks for the photos. The woman from the midwest is Dorothy. It's Carla, not Kara and the other woman is one of the at least 3 Lizes in attendence.
The book was to be my christmas present to Scott--I had trouble downloading the PDF of he program so I didnt' see the mistake until that morning.
I'll probably send the link to Linda and to some of hte people (Wally, for example) who couldn't be there? Does it bother you if it goes out on lists--both BM and Poly/Bi?
thank you, Koosh.
The book was to be my christmas present to Scott--I had trouble downloading the PDF of he program so I didnt' see the mistake until that morning.
I'll probably send the link to Linda and to some of hte people (Wally, for example) who couldn't be there? Does it bother you if it goes out on lists--both BM and Poly/Bi?
thank you, Koosh.
The Lady with a Lamprey
"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.
Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri
"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.
Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri
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PurpleKoosh
- Posts: 1638
- Joined: Wed Sep 03, 2003 11:26 pm
- Burning Since: 2003
- Camp Name: M*A*S*H 4207
- Location: Silly Valley, CA
- Contact:
Not at all. I crossposted it to my own journal as well as the burning_man and bi_the_bay communities on LJ, and I'll send it to the DMV list (and probably the Diox BM list, as well).
I'll make the corrections, thanks. (And who was that in the picture with you and the book?)
I'll make the corrections, thanks. (And who was that in the picture with you and the book?)
Anything purple is mine. Anything else can be dyed or painted.
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theCryptofishist
- Posts: 40312
- Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2004 9:28 am
- Burning Since: 2017
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I couldn't get there myself -- however my husband is "One of Scott's campmates back before ESD split off from the Rangers" (Image 16)
He is Ranger Rigged and he wanted to add that "he wanted to thank Bounce on behalf of "all" of the people he helped who didn't get a chance to thank him."
Blessings to you all.
Ranger Emerald
He is Ranger Rigged and he wanted to add that "he wanted to thank Bounce on behalf of "all" of the people he helped who didn't get a chance to thank him."
Blessings to you all.
Ranger Emerald
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PurpleKoosh
- Posts: 1638
- Joined: Wed Sep 03, 2003 11:26 pm
- Burning Since: 2003
- Camp Name: M*A*S*H 4207
- Location: Silly Valley, CA
- Contact:
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technopatra
- Posts: 727
- Joined: Mon Jun 16, 2003 3:04 pm
- Location: SF, CA
- Contact:
Scott's memorial service
This is xposted from elsewhere. I wanted to share my experience of the service with those of you who wanted to, but couldn't be there.
Many thanks to Koosh, for allowing me to keep her company during the ceremony. And to the piper - you were wonderful. There is nothing so mournful as bagpipes. I believe the sound of them helped some people tap more deeply into their grief when you played "Amazing Grace", and by doing so, helped them let go of it.
_______
I went to my first peer funeral on Saturday. More specifically, it was a memorial service for the husband of a friend I made when I used to be on the Eplaya. The other services I've been to were all for elderly relatives in my faily, most of whom had long or debilitating illnesses, and all of whom were at least in their late seventies. Or for the parent of a friend, where I could provide support, but felt no real grief myself.
The night the service before had been a tough one. I felt a migraine coming on at work around 3:30, and by the time I left at 5pm, it was full-blown. I had taken 4 Excedrin in 2.5 hours, twice my non-prescription mainstay, with no results. Though it was not yet entirely dark outside, the streetlights and car lights were killing me, poking into my sensitized eyes like toothpicks into meatballs. The smell of exhaust made my stomach lurch, and I was seriously afraid I wasn't going to make it home without heaving out my car door window. I was out of Imitrex, but that stuff doesn't work once you are deep into a migraine, anyway, so I stopped at a friend's who gave me some muscle relaxants to help. I ended up having to take three of them over a six-hour period, lying in a dark room with an ice pack on the side of my head, trying to slow and deepen my breathing, and meditate to soothe the sense of anguish you have when you are pain. I managed to fall asleep, exhausted, around 11:30.
Only to be woken up by gunshots at midnight. Two, then three more. I heard a crash and looked out my window, craning my head to see down the block where someone had hit-and-run two parked cars in front of the laundromat - aka the storefront outside of which the teenage gang drug dealers do their business - and in time to see five or six guys running down the sidewalk towards 17th. The cops were on the scene in minutes, and I later heard on the radio that someone was shot, but not fatally, and that the suspects had been chased in their car then caught up at Webster & Pacific.
So I went to sleep with murder on my mind, and woke up with mortality in my heart. I dressed in black, wondering why, when I wear black almost every other day of the year, that day I really <i>felt</i> that I was in mourning clothes. It was an outfit I'd worn before...to parties, to work, to buy cat food or go CD shopping; and I would, no doubt, wear it again for the trivial non-events. But it felt different that morning.
I drove across the bridge wondering why I was even going to the service. I had only met Scott and his wife theCryptofishist once, briefly. theCryptofishist is one of my favorite people on the Eplaya...whip-smart, funny, compassionate to them that have it coming and fair to everyone. I hadn't corresponded with her in about a year. But when I saw the newspaper article about Scott's death, it was the first time a death had truly given me pause. I recognized his name instantly, tho we'd met just the once, but I had to reread it three times before it sunk in. I sent theCryptofishist a note of condolence. Then Purple Koosh posted an entry with the information about the memorial. I can't explain it, I just had to go.
I'm glad I did. It was an amazing ceremony, part celebration of Scott's life, part grieving and letting go. Those parts intermingled, dancing together and apart and togther again throughout the afternoon. A dozen people spoke, and I learned more about Scott in those few hours than I had when he was alive. I knew he would have had to be a pretty special person to land theCryptofishist , but I had no idea.
Several people said how his death embodied who he was in life. He was killed during the bad storm in the middle of December. A driver had lost control of his car and slammed into the side divider, resting in a dangerous position facing oncoming traffic. Scott, an EMT, had just finished a shift and was on his way home. He saw the car, and immediately pulled over. He assisted and calmed the driver, who was not seriously hurt, then started putting out road flares to warn other motorists. Another second driver lost control of his car, and slammed into Scott, killing him.
It was senseless, tragic, and unfair, yet, as so many noted, it entirely epitomized who and what he was - a man wholly devoted to serving and helping others.
He volunteered his EMT skills for eight years at Burning Man and the SF Pride Parade. He volunteered his mentorship and gruntwork with a local bisexual support organization and an ROTC-like cadet program whose name I cannot remember. He was reported to have an uncanny knack for listening and soothing, even though he himself was beset by a number of medical and emotional challenges. His first true love had died unexpectedly, yet he managed to keep his heart open enough to find, love, and be loved by Chukka.
He also actively responded to emergency situations, whether he was on- or off- duty. He always carried his EMT kit, which stayed replenished by the on-duty EMTs who would arrive after him. Stories were told that when he lived in SOMA, near an accident-prone intersection, he would hear the screech of tires and bounce out with his kit, ready to help. This is how he earned his playaname - the nickname given to him by other Burners - "Bounce".
He also actively helped people in non-egerncy situations. He helpedthe homeless he encountered, not with quarters or dollars, but with water. He wisely observed that homeless people have very little access to water, or to containers to carry water, and would buy flats of bottled water to pass out among the homeless downtown and in the Tenderloin. He could walk through these toughest neighborhoods and people knew him. theCryptofishist provided flats of water, asking each of us to take a bottle and to give it to someone needy.
Though I never really knew him personally, the sense of grief and loss in that little church was so palpable that I could not stop the tears from pouring down my face and so many people gave up to the altar to share yet another story of Scott's goodwill, compassion, dedication, loyalty, and selflessness. People he work with, volunteered with, partied with. People he had counseled, consoled, healed and inspired. Friends, family, treammates, and even a waitress he had befriended had found their way up to the podium, each one nervous yet compelled to speak, to share what they had known of this wonderful man. The outpouring was so sincere, so moving. Nothing I can write can accurately describe it.
The officiant was another wonderful aspect. She truly, effectively helped the grieving mass work through a great deal of their grief by reminding us of something so important: us that while ceremonies are for those who remain, this was also Scott's chance to say goodbye, to let go and to pass to wherever it is that we go, to be welcomed back into the arms of...well, she did such a good job of tailoring her words to accomodate anyone's ideas of afterlife that I seem to remember it as if she referenced my own...that he was passing back into the energy of the universe, reuniting with it once freed from this body. She pointed this out: that by letting go of our grief for Scott, we were freeing him, as well.
Someone else told a story from Scott's childhood: when he was five or six years old, he was riding in a car with his father when they passed a car accident. Scott immediately yelled for his father to pull over, to help the people in the car. His father said they couldn't help, that they "wouldn't know what to do anyhow". He may have taken a roundabout way to achiee this, but clearly this incident help drive Scott: he wanted to be the one that <i>did</i> know what to do.
I have no pithy ending for this post. I had no great revelations, except one: I realized that part of the reason I was there, next to supporting theCryptofishist and representing the Burning Man that I am no longer a part of, was to prepare myself for the deaths I will eventually have to face. I hope that, being who he was, Scott wouldn't mind.
Cryptofishist , I am so so sorry for your loss. I hope you can find some solace in the fact even after his death, Scott has touched one more person. He is still an inspiration.
Rest in peace, Scott.
Many thanks to Koosh, for allowing me to keep her company during the ceremony. And to the piper - you were wonderful. There is nothing so mournful as bagpipes. I believe the sound of them helped some people tap more deeply into their grief when you played "Amazing Grace", and by doing so, helped them let go of it.
_______
I went to my first peer funeral on Saturday. More specifically, it was a memorial service for the husband of a friend I made when I used to be on the Eplaya. The other services I've been to were all for elderly relatives in my faily, most of whom had long or debilitating illnesses, and all of whom were at least in their late seventies. Or for the parent of a friend, where I could provide support, but felt no real grief myself.
The night the service before had been a tough one. I felt a migraine coming on at work around 3:30, and by the time I left at 5pm, it was full-blown. I had taken 4 Excedrin in 2.5 hours, twice my non-prescription mainstay, with no results. Though it was not yet entirely dark outside, the streetlights and car lights were killing me, poking into my sensitized eyes like toothpicks into meatballs. The smell of exhaust made my stomach lurch, and I was seriously afraid I wasn't going to make it home without heaving out my car door window. I was out of Imitrex, but that stuff doesn't work once you are deep into a migraine, anyway, so I stopped at a friend's who gave me some muscle relaxants to help. I ended up having to take three of them over a six-hour period, lying in a dark room with an ice pack on the side of my head, trying to slow and deepen my breathing, and meditate to soothe the sense of anguish you have when you are pain. I managed to fall asleep, exhausted, around 11:30.
Only to be woken up by gunshots at midnight. Two, then three more. I heard a crash and looked out my window, craning my head to see down the block where someone had hit-and-run two parked cars in front of the laundromat - aka the storefront outside of which the teenage gang drug dealers do their business - and in time to see five or six guys running down the sidewalk towards 17th. The cops were on the scene in minutes, and I later heard on the radio that someone was shot, but not fatally, and that the suspects had been chased in their car then caught up at Webster & Pacific.
So I went to sleep with murder on my mind, and woke up with mortality in my heart. I dressed in black, wondering why, when I wear black almost every other day of the year, that day I really <i>felt</i> that I was in mourning clothes. It was an outfit I'd worn before...to parties, to work, to buy cat food or go CD shopping; and I would, no doubt, wear it again for the trivial non-events. But it felt different that morning.
I drove across the bridge wondering why I was even going to the service. I had only met Scott and his wife theCryptofishist once, briefly. theCryptofishist is one of my favorite people on the Eplaya...whip-smart, funny, compassionate to them that have it coming and fair to everyone. I hadn't corresponded with her in about a year. But when I saw the newspaper article about Scott's death, it was the first time a death had truly given me pause. I recognized his name instantly, tho we'd met just the once, but I had to reread it three times before it sunk in. I sent theCryptofishist a note of condolence. Then Purple Koosh posted an entry with the information about the memorial. I can't explain it, I just had to go.
I'm glad I did. It was an amazing ceremony, part celebration of Scott's life, part grieving and letting go. Those parts intermingled, dancing together and apart and togther again throughout the afternoon. A dozen people spoke, and I learned more about Scott in those few hours than I had when he was alive. I knew he would have had to be a pretty special person to land theCryptofishist , but I had no idea.
Several people said how his death embodied who he was in life. He was killed during the bad storm in the middle of December. A driver had lost control of his car and slammed into the side divider, resting in a dangerous position facing oncoming traffic. Scott, an EMT, had just finished a shift and was on his way home. He saw the car, and immediately pulled over. He assisted and calmed the driver, who was not seriously hurt, then started putting out road flares to warn other motorists. Another second driver lost control of his car, and slammed into Scott, killing him.
It was senseless, tragic, and unfair, yet, as so many noted, it entirely epitomized who and what he was - a man wholly devoted to serving and helping others.
He volunteered his EMT skills for eight years at Burning Man and the SF Pride Parade. He volunteered his mentorship and gruntwork with a local bisexual support organization and an ROTC-like cadet program whose name I cannot remember. He was reported to have an uncanny knack for listening and soothing, even though he himself was beset by a number of medical and emotional challenges. His first true love had died unexpectedly, yet he managed to keep his heart open enough to find, love, and be loved by Chukka.
He also actively responded to emergency situations, whether he was on- or off- duty. He always carried his EMT kit, which stayed replenished by the on-duty EMTs who would arrive after him. Stories were told that when he lived in SOMA, near an accident-prone intersection, he would hear the screech of tires and bounce out with his kit, ready to help. This is how he earned his playaname - the nickname given to him by other Burners - "Bounce".
He also actively helped people in non-egerncy situations. He helpedthe homeless he encountered, not with quarters or dollars, but with water. He wisely observed that homeless people have very little access to water, or to containers to carry water, and would buy flats of bottled water to pass out among the homeless downtown and in the Tenderloin. He could walk through these toughest neighborhoods and people knew him. theCryptofishist provided flats of water, asking each of us to take a bottle and to give it to someone needy.
Though I never really knew him personally, the sense of grief and loss in that little church was so palpable that I could not stop the tears from pouring down my face and so many people gave up to the altar to share yet another story of Scott's goodwill, compassion, dedication, loyalty, and selflessness. People he work with, volunteered with, partied with. People he had counseled, consoled, healed and inspired. Friends, family, treammates, and even a waitress he had befriended had found their way up to the podium, each one nervous yet compelled to speak, to share what they had known of this wonderful man. The outpouring was so sincere, so moving. Nothing I can write can accurately describe it.
The officiant was another wonderful aspect. She truly, effectively helped the grieving mass work through a great deal of their grief by reminding us of something so important: us that while ceremonies are for those who remain, this was also Scott's chance to say goodbye, to let go and to pass to wherever it is that we go, to be welcomed back into the arms of...well, she did such a good job of tailoring her words to accomodate anyone's ideas of afterlife that I seem to remember it as if she referenced my own...that he was passing back into the energy of the universe, reuniting with it once freed from this body. She pointed this out: that by letting go of our grief for Scott, we were freeing him, as well.
Someone else told a story from Scott's childhood: when he was five or six years old, he was riding in a car with his father when they passed a car accident. Scott immediately yelled for his father to pull over, to help the people in the car. His father said they couldn't help, that they "wouldn't know what to do anyhow". He may have taken a roundabout way to achiee this, but clearly this incident help drive Scott: he wanted to be the one that <i>did</i> know what to do.
I have no pithy ending for this post. I had no great revelations, except one: I realized that part of the reason I was there, next to supporting theCryptofishist and representing the Burning Man that I am no longer a part of, was to prepare myself for the deaths I will eventually have to face. I hope that, being who he was, Scott wouldn't mind.
Cryptofishist , I am so so sorry for your loss. I hope you can find some solace in the fact even after his death, Scott has touched one more person. He is still an inspiration.
Rest in peace, Scott.
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technopatra
- Posts: 727
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- Contact:
>He is Ranger Rigged and he wanted to add that "he wanted to thank Bounce on behalf of "all" of the people he helped who didn't get a chance to thank him."
Emerald, please tell him that this was greatly appreciated. All the speakers brought a different aspect of Scott's person, but when Rigged thanked him, he slid a key piece in place. And set off a fresh wave of much-needed tears.
Emerald, please tell him that this was greatly appreciated. All the speakers brought a different aspect of Scott's person, but when Rigged thanked him, he slid a key piece in place. And set off a fresh wave of much-needed tears.
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theCryptofishist
- Posts: 40312
- Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2004 9:28 am
- Burning Since: 2017
- Location: In Exile