Five Years - I Can Hardly Believe It!

Melinda informed me this evening that it had been 5 years since our dear friend Valerie had passed. I could hardly believe it as I still think of her on a near-daily basis. I served as best man at her and Bob Goff's wedding back in the '80s, and seemingly got a lifetime of a loyal friend, advocate, and someone who was always "there" for me. Some of these photos have appeared here before, but after reviewing a few years of my photo archives, she mostly appears at the life-altering events. Of course, at left, she appears in her "Elton John" sunglasses among our "Arizona Family" who travelled cross-country to come to our Hawaiian-themed wedding in 2008. She was fond of the large glasses - I perhaps wouldn't recognize her without them! At right she was eating a meal with us in Charleston, SC, where she and buddy Roger accompanied me to scatter my first wife Vicki's ashes in Charleston harbor with the Quave family in 2005. It seems I've got lots of photos of her eating, perhaps because that is where we met socially on a regular basis...



She survived 10 years after the passing of Bob, and they were the loves of their lives! They did everything together, and after his death in 2001, she established a memorial lecture in his name at Riverside Telescope Makers Conference, an annual astronomers event in Big Bear, CA. So she was a regular there as well - at left appearing with Jack Eastman, who is nearly as crazy as he appears! We both loved RTMC as back in "the day", we knew most everyone who attended and was the social event of the year. At right is a shot of her earlobe, where she wore an outline of the constellation Orion. Her husband Bob always wanted to go to the Great Orion Nebula when he "grew up", so she always looked forward to joining him there. Once Bob Died and she was living alone, she saved up all her conversation for when you saw her - that woman could talk your ear off! Everything from politics to old stories (she had an elephant's memory - a trait she must have picked up from her years in Africa), to blunt opinions about your girlfriend - all were on the table - just about what I miss the most...

I'm haunted by a line I heard a while back - "They say you die twice, one time when you stop breathing, and a second time, a bit later, when someone says your name for the last time". It is attributed to the graffiti artist Banksy, but others have expressed similar sentiments earlier. In other words, we all exist as long as our loved ones continue to remember us and mention our names. It's certainly true as I feel she is still by our side, helping us through the rough spots in our lives. May we all have and appreciate friends like her!