Hi
Thank you for nominating me the most prestigious award and I won the award. I wanted to thank you and googled your name. Shocked and speechless,  even after you passed away you are still helping and showing to be kind. You will always be remembered in my life. Thank you.

I miss Alexa. She gave me this for my birthday this year (April 2020) and wore an identical one. While I may be known to have a big personality like Lex, when it comes to something personal like this, I tend to be very quiet and introspective. I haven’t been able to bring myself to read most of the posts on Forever Missed or Facebook. I have read some, and what I have read is spot on. Though I tend to shy away from public posting, I hope that some of my words will dovetail well with other's sentiments about her.

The words that I can use to describe Alexa are endless. If a book were to be written about her it would be an epic novel and if a play were to be scripted it would be a musical filled with singing and dancing. For now, I will begin with one word, extraordinary. Noting that the key here is EXTRA, and she was, in every imaginable way. As many have expressed, she was endlessly positive, abundantly joyful, generally full of laughter, and ready for an adventure at the drop of a hat. If there was the slightest mention of dancing, there was no waiting for a dance floor (or even music sometimes) she was shaking what her momma gave her THAT VERY SECOND, and I loved her for that. She was known as a scientist, a student, a mentor, a conservationist, an activist, a leader, a confidant, a buddy, a friend, a fan. She was your fan, my fan, a fan of animals of all kinds, of dark chocolate (we all know the stash that always existed in her freezer or in some random bag she was carrying), of wearing workout wear 24/7, of dancing (any style), of music (you could talk to her about any band or any artist from the 1960s through today…just leave out the 80’s, apparently that was a decade that did not exist). 

She was tenacious, resourceful, and a force to be reckoned with. She was a collector. You name it, she had it. If you ever tried to pick up that lead brick she called a backpack, been to any of her living spaces, or been involved in any of her moves you know what I am talking about .  She collected people too. Wonderful, kind, insightful, big-hearted people. She collected them like they were going out of style. She saw the best in people and made an effort to bring joy into other’s lives as often as she was able.

Alexa was resilient and fiercely independent. If something managed to knock her down, she found a way to get back up with added vigor. She had extremely high standards and expectations of herself and was a high achiever. She was someone you could always count on to help.

All of these things made her beautiful.

Alexa was also human. She did have moments that were not perfect. Watching her learn to accept and work with the things that were not perfect also made her beautiful. When I first met her, she was STEADFAST on not asking for help, even when she clearly needed it. And then she changed. She learned to reach out and ask for what she needed. What was even more exciting was that she was proud of herself. She had always been so proud of others. I loved receiving those phone calls when she voiced how proud she was about doing good things for herself.

Alexa was a sailor at heart. She lived to be on the water. In the water. Near the water. Talking about being on the water or the next time she would be sailing. Or just on a boat.

She was an animal lover. All animals. The girl could warm up to a rattlesnake. And while dolphins may have been special to her… we all know secretly deep down… her favorite animal *might* have been the loyal dog. If her two recent adoptions were not evidence, look back at her love for Edna (her mom’s unbelievably adorable dog) and even MY dog got a following on HER Snapchat (if anyone remembers Sexy pug).

Alexa was a comedian, and most of the time it was on purpose. One of my favorite Alexa comedy moments was when she was asked by a doctor (after surgery on her wrist) to wiggle her middle finger. To encourage movement, he kept tapping on her finger with his pen and her finger was not moving. Mind you, she was still groggy from anesthesia. Come on Alexa move this finger (tap, tap, tap). Nothing. So, we are all encouraging her, the doctor, the nurses, me, and guess what… up shoots her finger… the middle one, ON THE OTHER HAND. Classic! We all agreed, including Alexa, her funny bone was still intact. In addition to great comedic timing, she used incredible terminology like “hair wookies” to describe the gobs of hair we lose when showering. It was as if she was Mary Poppins inventing her very own Supercalifragilisticexbialadocious vocabulary. It was the best!

I could fill endless pages on who Alexa was. Bottom line? She was EXTRA. And I will miss every EXTRA thing about her. There is nobody that will ever fill the hole in my heart that has been left by her absence.

Alexa, there are so many memories, experiences, and moments we had together that I will never forget, least of all the very first day I met you (fasten your seatbelts everyone, this story is a wildly unbelievable, yet very true, roller coaster ride). Summers were always extremely busy for you in San Diego. Yet, despite that, you didn’t hesitate when Leigh asked you to come up to Oregon in July 2018 to teach me, the newest GEMM Lab member, all there was to know about the Port Orford gray whale project. You had never met me before and you had only participated in the Port Orford project for a week the previous summer, but none of that stopped you. You flew to Portland from San Diego and made your way to Newport. We loaded up the MMI truck with all the gear and headed south towards Port Orford. So far, so good. Great, even! You pulled off the highway any chance we got so I could marvel at the beauty of the Oregon coast. But that all changed when we got to Coos Bay where we planned to stock up on groceries. You, ever so organized & thoughtful, had already compiled a grocery list but as we were going up and down the aisle, adding things to our cart, you suddenly realized that your phone was missing. We retraced our steps. Nothing. As always, you were quick on your feet, and connected to the Safeway wifi on your tablet to use the ‘Find My iPhone’ app to help solve the mystery. Lo-and-behold, your phone was no longer in the store…We drove to the location and arrived at what we always describe as a “creepy-looking motel” (although under any other circumstance the motel would have probably looked totally normal). We surveyed our surroundings and made notes (I still have that note on my phone) about all the people and vehicles we saw. One person in particular drew our attention because out of the back of his car he pulled out several…Safeway grocery bags!!! Feeling giddy about our amateur-sleuthing but also nervous because we were sitting in a pretty conspicuous white government truck in a motel parking lot, you decided that it was probably time to call the police. Two officers arrived and it soon was revealed that the man we had seen with Safeway bags had indeed just been at Safeway with his daughter. Apparently, his daughter had a habit of stealing and he told the officers he was confident that his daughter had stolen the phone and that he would call them as soon as he found it. There wasn’t much for us to do so you decided it would be best to drive to Port Orford, get settled in and once we heard from the police, we could drive back to Coos Bay. We did eventually hear from the police and drove all the way back to Coos Bay in the dark, only to find that your phone was completely destroyed. The night involved more adventures (including sleeping on the floor but that’s a whole other story), yet, the next day (the 4th of July), you let none of these events stop us from making s’mores (my first ones ever!) and watching the dinghy race & fireworks from the field station. You blazed on, with your unparalleled optimism and determination, to ensure that I not only learned everything that I needed to know to be able to run the project, but that we also had a great time while learning. Alexa, I will cherish the time we had together forever and I miss you so incredibly much.