My friend Ian died. It hurts my fingers to type those words.
For the past month, I have been consumed by his death- I was his emergency contact and connected many of the dots.
None of his family came down, so it fell to me and his friend's to clean out his apartment.
Man oh man, that really sucked but luckily for me, I have a strong chosen family team. I was able to ask them to do tasks: talk to people, order food, pickups from the airport and the like.
When his mom requested that we put together a service, I knew immediately what I wanted to say, but was afraid that I wasn't going to be able to convey it in words.
How do you sum up a person in 250 words who left suddenly and who had been one of the most important people in your life for 30 years?
You don't...
You listen to others who say amazing things about this person and try to absorb everything.
A friend put a beautiful blog post together of what she said at his service.
https://hulainthesunset.blogspot.com/2020/01/laughing-without-smiling.html?fbclid=IwAR1ItERSv_RGuMxRed_tGCTCFWPZ075b567EHA4Nof_GbqNrfbBWQtHh3L8
And below is what I said-
Ian was a love of my life- completely platonic and unconditional.
He never did anything wrong to me.
I found his inappropriate comments charming, his super dramatic
responses to everyday things hilarious and that fact that he thought it was
funny to give really bad advice adorable.
He would insist on paying for everything when I knew he was broke and
was relentless in trying to get me to watch horrible tv shows.
I met Ian when he was 17 years old. He had just moved to California;
he was wearing a Sid Vicious shirt and we instantly bonded over music. During
his stint in Southern California, he was staying with me at my parent’s house
and it unnerved my grandmother Nanny that Ian slept with his shoes on. Ian and I decided around Christmas time to
move to San Francisco. We left in February and for the next 11 years lived
together.
We often would go grocery shopping together; he would berate me
for buying food that was not on sale. He had a pretty strict policy then that
he only purchased items that were on sale – his preference actually that it was
a buy one and get one free- we came home, and I asked him if he had ever eaten,
I Can’t Believe It’s Butter before. Ian grabbed it out of my hand started
yelling “I can’t believe it’s not butter,” over and over again and then threw
the container against the wall. It was buy one, get one free so not all was
lost.
When we moved into the second Haight Street apartment, he lived in
the living room. So in the morning, I would have to knock on his doorway to make
sure it was okay to go through to the kitchen. In the mornings, he would greet
me with “it is a good day for the apocalypse.” When we were really broke, he
and I would put our change together and buy Taco Bell or cigarettes. In passing
he asked me to attend his college graduation, he was going to be a speaker. Of
course, I would attend. He wasn’t a speaker- he was the main speaker. He got an
award for his excellence and was the equivalent to the valedictorian of his
class. The speech was so good, I was all teary and he just rolled his eyes at
me.
When me and my now husband were getting serious, Ian and I made a
pack that regardless of our relationship status that we would always be there
for each other. It wasn’t until I was married did I change my emergency
contact. After Heather died, Ian told me he was changing it back to me.
When I introduced Ian to Heather, it was no set up or anything.
Just my new friend, meeting my old friend. It was crazy town to watch them hit
it off. Ian was charming and he insisted on showering before going out to do
stuff with her. One of the many conversations I had about Ian to Heather, I
remember telling her that moving to SF was a good idea, that I had never seen
Ian so smitten with anyone before and she should go for it. So them getting
married was a no brainer. He called me on the phone and told me -after talking
to me for 15 minutes about why I should watch some vampire show- that he and
Heather were gonna wrap things up and get married. I was so excited for him and
started getting teary on the phone and he got annoyed that I was getting so
emotional.
After Heather died, I checked in with Ian once a week and if he
didn’t respond, I would be relentless until he got back to me.
His sadness over losing her was something that I couldn’t
understand until now.
Since Ian was not remotely religious, I wanted to say to all of
you-
The force of Ian will be with you- always.
I will miss you so much.
I wish I was still your emergency contact.
