Rest in power Brother Dan

[King Bob]

I am stunned. Hard to believe.

[Drunk Monk]

There is to be a memorial this Saturday in Wasilla at 11AM.  Dan is being cremated.  I would've gone but I'm locked hard into Florida this weekend.  

We are working on putting together a memorial in SF when Sylvia comes to town, probably Sunday Nov 3, because that's when several of us had planned to get together for dinner.  I'll keep you all informed, of course.

On cremation - Syl mentioned some sort of necklace that they make with the ashes.  It's very ironic to me.  Dan and I shared a skull fetish for years.  It was akin to the 'weapon of the week' that Cole and I shared when we were teens. It goes back as far. Dan and I collected skulls and skull art.  We gave each other skull gifts and always tried to best each other with cooler skulls.  My skull tastes were more anatomical, or deadhead obviously (it was actually the skull art that drew me into the dead more than the music at first).  Dan's tastes were more heavy metal and dia de los muertos.  I put the bulk of my skull collection into storage when Tara was born - there are several moving boxes full of skulls at my mom's marked 'Warning skulls inside' prominently because I felt that was the way to pack them.  I only kept my best ones out, on my altar in my man cave at Ranch Macbeth.  But when we moved to the micro-bungalow, those went into storage too.  All except one. The real one.  I had a real human skull that I acquired through a medical supply company just prior to human bones being illegal to trade.  It was of an old woman - very fine, very fragile sinuses, no teeth and the mandible/maxilla were ground down flat.  I always treated her with the greatest respect.  When we moved to the bungalow, I gave her to Dan. After literally decades of our skull one-up-man-ship, Dan conceded. 'You win' he said with a grin.  He found her a nice cabinet box.  I'm not sure where she is now.  I never asked if he took her to Alaska.  

He gave me a skeletool leatherman as a 'best man' gift when he married Syl.  He knew my love of leathermans, but the skeletool is a dumb one.  It's designed so it can be opened one-handed, which sacrifices a lot of the fundamental functionality of the leatherman pliers design.  But the name was worth it.  It cut me almost instantly when I was starting to work the action.  I texted him immediately, trying not to bleed on my phone.  He laughed.  I did too.  Bon touche, mon ami.  It's been my daily carry ever since.  I've made my peace with it.  It's actually perfect for office box cutting here at Tiger Claw.  I just had it sharpened again about a month ago.  I even mentioned it in my tournament review this year in the ribbon cutting ceremony paragraph - http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/arti...ticle=1504

With the cremation ash necklace, well, it's not a skull, but we did bones too, just not as much. As Dan used to say 'you haven't been boned until you've been legboned.' Now he's reached out from beyond the grave for one last jab.  In the end, he won.  

Well played, Dan.

[Greg]

Who put all this water on my keyboard, dammit?

[King Bob]

DM got me with that last one too

[thatguy]

I feel like I didn't really know Dan...Like the pictures Greg keeps posting on FB of the two of us in the same frame are the actual only times we've ever met. I feel your collective loss more than my own. My thoughts are with you. I'm house sitting this week, but will raise a skull of Scapa when I'm back home.

--tg

[Drunk Monk]

At my mom's as per my caretaking routine.  After checking in with my mom, I began randomly searching for traces of Dan in my piles of crap stored here.  I haven't found anything that notable yet.  

I was looking at my last texts with Dan.  Unfortunately, I deleted a lot of text threads recently, as is my penchant to make storage room on my phone.  I only have a short strings of texts left, our discussion of his trip here in the first week of November.  His final text to me was:

What time works for you?

[Drunk Monk]

And now, I'm in dialog with Ruth.  I haven't seen her since I helped Dan move out.  

Been touching base with a lot of old friends and acquaintances over this. It's surreal. Dan was in all my circles somewhere - here of course, but also Rock Med, JAH Med, and the martial world (not only because of the Dragon crew, but also through his former acupuncture connections, plus he did practice escrima for a while).  

Yesterday was pretty rough for me.  In a weird way, I'm looking forward to Florida just to get my mind off it all and give my tear ducts a break.

Halloween isn't helping.  The skull fetish haunts me and I now see Halloween skulls thinking how Dan might approve or mock it.  It reminds me that he pulled the best DOOM Night Drop on me of all.  

It was Halloween, when Stacy and I were living at Saint Barbarian, that funky house that was falling down the hillside near Daly City Bart, technically the only time I lived in SF because the border was right down our street.  I went by there a few months ago.  It was totally trashed, in terrible shape, garbage in the yard - it sullied my memory.  The house was flipped sideways and split into two tenant spaces.  Our front door was actually the back door of the original design, so it had this weird entrance with a covered walkway up a few steps, sort of a stairwell but you couldn't see into it as you came down from the street.  Stacy and I had gone to a show that night - I think it was a Jerry Garcia Halloween show, maybe at Kaiser?  I can't quite remember.  Dan had dropped a fully clothed CPR mannequin, seated on the stairs, cradling bottles of Duval and Satan Ale. It was beautifully arranged, total DOOM style. So I come home from the show, full on post-show-glow, turn the corner and there's this body seated on my staircase in front of my front door.  Stacy says I made a weird yelp, a type of noise she'd never heard me make before.  When she told Dan about that, they both sniggered profusely.  

I kept that mannequin for years, trying to find an opportunity to Night Drop it on one of you.  It was a life size body, and by then, most of us were living in spaces that weren't Night Drop friendly.  Eventually, I think I gave it back to Dan.  It was taking up too much space to have this body lying around, and it was lifelike enough that it would make you jump if you came upon it unexpectedly.

[Greg]

I was wondering if Ruth was going to resurface and I'm not happy she did. Although she is the mother of LB's kids.

Come on Florida.

I'm hoping the memorial is after the 3rd so I can attend. Selfish, but that's me.

[Drunk Monk]

It'll probably be the 3rd.  Sylvia is only down for a week and I think that weekend will be the only time she is here.  We must find a venue, however.

Ruth and Dan made their peace and let go of the past.  I think the birth of their grandson Christopher helped them to resolve their issues, or at least, get over them.

[Greg]

Crap. That will be a trick.

[Drunk Monk]

You got those pix to the Memorial this weekend.  I imagine we'll use the same reel for the Celebration of Life.  So whatever happens, you'll be there - you're work will be there at the very least.

[Greg]

Got to stand up. Got to show respect.

[Drunk Monk]

Just spent the last two hours texting and commiserating with Syl. She's a wreck, barely holding on, but fortunately she has access to sleeping aids (the perks of being a PA), neighbors that are bringing food, and family helping out. She showed me the selection of ash keepsakes offered by the crematorium. For a moment, I thought a cheesey cross or heart (which is like most of the offerings) would be funny because it would piss Dan off. "Sorry no skulls" she texted when sending several snaps of catalog pages.  She also said the true skull is in AK, and Syl plans to ship it back to me when things settle. How morbid, in the literal sense of that word. 

We promised to have a long chat about Dan when this all settles.  He was a complicated man, more so than most who weren't intimate with him might realize, haunted by so many demons.  And yet, we came to a lot of crossroads in our adventures together, forks between the light and the dark.  He always chose the light around me, even when I was leaning more towards darkness. I remain inspired by his good heart, despite all the demons that tormented him as long as I knew him.

Ruth said Amber is heading up for the AK memorial. They had connected more profoundly after her son was born. Bryan is more standoffish, but Ruth said it's the first time she's really seen him cry.  Dan had encouraged him to pursue RM and JM, and I was really looking forward to taking him under wing, but it never happened and now, probably never will.  

The CA memorial squad is starting to move forward a little, but not much, after I did some prodding. My momentum is dropping however. Tomorrow I've got to switch gears to Florida - I fly out first thing Friday morn.  I promised to help proofread some memorial pamphlet text tomorrow too. 

I didn't cry this much for my dad, but my dad was expected for over a decade and Dan was a total shock.  Now at my mom's home, in my old room where so much of my crap is stored, I see weird echoes of him in dusty corners.  I can't find my Dan sticks - I got so many sticks.  Those are buried here somewhere under swords, nunchucks, tonfas, batons, blades and a ridiculous amount of knives.  I found some goofy skull toys, things he definitely gave me because who else would?  I really need to clean this room.  

I really need to sleep. That's what I need.  Last night, I drank a fair share of my dad's whiskey, not his JD of which there's only a little remaining, but a bottle of Old Smuggler he had. It's terrible, as bland as whiskey could be, but you can drink a lot of it.  Tonight I'm foregoing that because I want to hit Kung Fu tomorrow night and work off some anger so I don't want to get any more dehydrated than I already am from so damn much crying.

[Drunk Monk]

I’ve been wearing all black in mourning since I got the news. That’s no stretch for me, as I’m sure y’all remember. Dan and I used to joke about how we were goth before that was even a thing, and Joan we coulda been kings of goths, perched on our skull Thrones with a harem of goth chicks at our beck and call.

Then Jerry psychodelitiedyed us.

Syl says the service went well. I texted Greg some pics to post here that she sent me. JAH Med went a ‘stunning’ bouquet she says. RMs director texted me when I got on the plane to FL. Turns out he’s in Orlando on vacay with his kids. He said he’d reach out to Syl but has not yet.

Today I’m wearing some grey. Baby steps...

[Greg]

I'll go look for the pics. I haven't checked my phone since early last night.