Monthly Archives: March 2012

Saturday afternoon – Dylan at 19

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I woke today thinking of our freind Dylan. He would have been 19 years old today… a week after his
18th birthday he was killed in a single car accident on his way home.. His healthy organs helped save 4 peoples lives. Here.. like in many things.. he was much like Sam.. a great athlete.. smart.. lots of freinds.. When Sam died, Dylan really stepped in to help Gabe.. He was like a big brother to Gabe.. The two of them rode together at Bolton, at Stowe… and eventually at the USASA National Finals at Copper Mountain, CO where Dylan won 1st place. I went with Dylan, his mom Sue, our freind Matt and Gabe on that trip.. it doesn’t seem long ago at all.. As close as we are.. I don’t know what it would liek to be Gabe now.

Dylan was a fun and quirky kid.. whip-smart, irreverent, talented in many things. Today his family is going through that first hard birthday without Dylan. We know how hard these anniversaries can be.. birthdays, deathdays, holidays. For me, the worst part is the lead up to those days.. how will it feel, what will we do.. how do we get through the day ? (which we always do)

We had dinner last night with Dylan’s family.. it was fun being out. We went to Sikura’s where I once watched Dylan eat a whole chunk of wasabi on a dare from Gabe. Jim, Sue and Dani were doing OK. They were doing what they had to do.. My heart goes out to them and all of Dylan’s freinds.. and .. of course to Dylan today.. They will find as we have that while the hurt doesn’t go away.. it changes.. and becomes more integrated with your lives. Jim and Sue are great people and great freinds.. I’d ask veryone to send them love and supprt today and in this coming week. I’d also ask all of Dylans freinds to honor him today/tonight by doing somethign for him…. or soemthing that reminds you of him.. go play in the snow, offer up a toast, light a candle. Keep that kids great and wacky spirit moving through our lives.

We love you dylan.. happy birthday man…

nite all, nite sam
-me

Friday night – stacks

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Oy.. I’m exhausted.. a long , busy.. and pretty upbeat week. I’m about 2 months into my new job and starting to get the hang of it. I’m in sponge mode, trying to learn as much as I can about the area I’ve just joined. It’s all new.. the people, the  acronyms, the problems.. and I love I’m spending every waking hour trying to cram all this stuff into my head. My normal routine now is to print all the email that I get that’s longer than 1 paragraph. I’m not able to read anything longer than that on a screen for some reason.. So far, I haven’t been able to read it on a kindle either. Right now I need to have old fashioned paper I’m no luddite.. but I think it’s part of my general  reading problem.. This presents several problems.. 1st.. I now show up at home with a 2 to 4 inch stack of stuff to read every night .. I generally start after the family goes to bed  and am still at it until nearly 1AM.. 2nd.. That leaves me wiht a huge pile of double sided printout that’s hard to reuse.. I feel like an ecoterrorist.. third.. I’m usually way out of synch with online conversations. Most folks have replied twice by the time I’ve had a chance to read an email thread..

What to do ? Has anyone had any luck using an ipad for this ? .. or is there some other trick I should apply to reading my laptop ? A bigger sreen perhaps ?

Sign me treekiller in jonesville

 

-nite all, nite sam

-me

Thursday night – late – Tone deaf

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Tone deaf.. that’s what I was feeling today. I feel like everyone else seems to be so much more clued in to what’s going on around me than I am.. The last straw was tonight.   I had made plans to meet the UVM SEED team that I’m advising at 3PM tomorrow . I called my freind Victor to invite him to the meeting. Victor’s wife Patti’s frst words to me were “Stay away from UVM tomorrow”.. Why .. I asked ?   “Because Pres . Obama’ is speaking there tomorrow.. :. How did I not know that ?!?  Seems like everyone else I know seemed to have been clued in to that for weeks..

Same sort of thing happened with iht my blog last night about Trevon Martin. One of my favorite readers let me know that I might have come off as a little off the mark in my interpretation of what was going on in the Trevon story. Another told me Ithat he’d agreed with me.  Whichever you felt.. I hope I did not offend anyone. . I had commented on the media swirl around  Trevons parents. To be truthful, I wasn’t as up on the fact of the case as I should have been. I did not know about the circumstances  or history of Trevon’s killer, .. I  did not know anything about the two sides of the story.. and I did not know anything about the new evidence that apparently surfaced .  All that I did not know. Still stand by my feeling that I can only feel deeply sad for Trevon and his parents…. I felt grief, not anger .. not yet.. There will be a time for that , I’m sure. As I dug in a little more today I could see the good that might come out of this tragedy  in the conversations it starts. Let’s hope for that..

Now.. it’s time for me to start paying more attention to the world.

nite all, nite sam

-me

Wednesday night – Trevon Martin

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I’m trapped with a TV again.. waiting in an airport on my way home. There’s a TV here that I can’t escape.. Again, the running story is the tragedy of the 17 year old kid, Trevon Martin who was shot by a volunteer security guy. I’ve been here for about 45 minutes and the conversation continues, the same image of the smiling kids, the face of the guy who killed him. the police videos, the grieving parents. Then a quick cut.. and an aging entertainer comes on the show.. he sings a few songs.. then the shows host brings the conversation back to Trevon Martin.. What’s going on here ? This is not an issue of race, it’s not an issue of vigilantism.. it’s a tragic mistake.. two people in the wrong place, and dreadfully wrong circumstances.. and at least 4 shattered lives..
A bit ago the news guy had an interview with Trevon’s parents.. he was asking them questions like “was your son’s killing racially motivated”, “what do you think should happen now”.. and on and one. The poor kids parents were remarkably composed. They were clearly grief stricken and angry.. but they did their best to answer the questions posed to them.. My heart just went out to them.. Here they were in the center of a huge media spectacle of a huge media circus.. and they just needed to grieve.. Anyone who’s been through sudden loss like this will back me up on this.. there is no time or logic so close to a death of a loved one.. you just need to go to that really dark place and try to take it in.. and you need to be surrounded by love… not anger.. not curiosity.. not questioning. What’s happening to those poor folks is the worst torture I can imagine on top of the deepest loss. I wish the the world could leave them alone for just a few days..

I don’t know these folks, but I’m sending out love and support to all of them.. .on both sides.
nite all, nite sam
-me