It’s hard to believe that you have been gone for 5 years now. You are still so much a part of me. Back when you first died, I didn’t understand how pervasive this grief would be. I didn’t know how it would evolve and deepen. I’ve since realized that there is no “getting over it.” I’ve learned to live without you, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t missed. 

After 5 years, I’ve definitely gotten better at dealing with grief. I’ve learned to “ride the waves” or, at least, how to swim through them. I often feel happy, enjoying our children and the simple things that bring pleasure to my life. Every single day, I choose life, and I know that is how you would want it to be. However, the grief beast is never really tamed. Like a person who keeps a lion as a pet, I never know when or if it will show its true nature. Sometimes, the tamest, most mundane things can be a trigger. Most often, the sadness comes from knowing what you are missing in this new life Daphne, Henry, and I have created.

I cannot erase you from my heart and mind because that would be like erasing myself. We happily chose to build a life together, and for 19 years, you slept beside me. You were the first person I saw and spoke to every morning, and the last one I shared a word with every night. You were my lover and best friend. We were so close that we often finished each other’s sentences. We created and raised two beautiful children together. I am the person I am today because of you.

Daphne, Henry, and I still have rough days. There are still many days when I simply miss talking to you, about both simple and profound things. I miss your perspective. I miss learning from you. When you died, I lost the other half of 19 years worth of joint memories, and at times, that still makes me ache with loneliness. It’s also heartbreaking how your death was so tragic and sad, and so avoidable. It still makes me cry for you at times because death is so permanent and there are so many questions that can never be answered. I feel as though our children, in particular, are missing out. As a mother, that breaks my heart. I know the smart, rational man that I knew would not have wanted that.

Terry often in my thoughts. 

Such lovely words from everyone.

Thinking of Angelique and Henry and Daphne.

Can’t believe how like Henry is to his beloved Daddy

Its strange how we ask why. 
Sometimes time and space lets us learn answers

I miss you every day. I can't imagine there ever being a day when I won't think of you.

 

Thank you, Terry, for our two beautiful children.

Thank you for teaching me how to love and be loved.

Thank you for being so supportive through my many incarnations of graduate school.

Thank you for all the times you stayed home with the kids so I could study, take walks, go to work, plan lessons, and do the things that made me happy.

Thank you for holding my hand and helping through my rough birthing of Henry.

Thank you for taking care of me when I was sick.

Thank you for always telling me that I was beautiful, especially when I didn’t feel it.

Thank you for always being so proud to be with me.

Thank you for watching Jane Austen adaptations with me.

Thank you for always being open to my hair-brained schemes and ideas (like not buying new things for an entire year).

Thank you for always doing the laundry.

Thank you for always making me laugh.

Thank you for teaching me how to parallel park.

Thank you for changing, rinsing, and cleaning thousands of cloth baby diapers.

Thank you for the many fun road trips and vacations.

Thank you for always being protective of me and our children.

Thank you for the times you worked our preschool workday when I didn't feel like it.

Thank you for encouraging and loving our children, and for all the gifts you’ve given them.

Thank you for taking me backpacking.

Thank for you for always being cheerful in the mornings.

Thank you for teaching me how to light a fire, set up a tent, and all the many things I learned about camping from you.

Thank you for the quiet talks and deep discussions.

Thank you for always keeping me up to date on the news and current events.

Thank you for taking Daphne, Henry, and I to Giants games, and for teaching me to appreciate baseball broadcasting on the radio.

Thank you for taking the night train to Rome with me.

Thank you for many family game nights.

Thank you for teaching our children about the stars and constellations.

Thank you for all the thoughtful words you wrote to me.

Thank you for teaching Daphne how to ride a bike.

Thank you for teaching Henry to tie his shoes.

Thank you for holding me when I was scared, cheering me when I was down, and for always being my champion.

Thank you for the many hikes together, and for all the hours you sat on beaches with me.

Thank you for wanting to spend your life with me.

Thank you for kissing me on the streets of Paris in the rain.

Thank you for the Sunday morning waffles.

Thank you for taking our jalopies to the auto shop whenever something was wrong with them.

Thank you for buying that car with me.

Thank you for being my best friend.

Thank you for holding me in your strong arms and always making me feel safe.

Thank you for your kisses.

Thank you for working so hard for us all the time.

Thank you for loving me.

This was the eulogy given at Terry's Celebration of Life ceremony on Friday, September 5th 2014 at Point Reyes National Seashore.
***

Good afternoon, I'm Shari, one of Terry's older sisters. On behalf of his family, I want to thank all of you for coming to honor my brother and to celebrate his life. I also want to thank everyone for the cards, phone calls, emails, text messages, gifts of food, flowers, care and comfort. If you've ever wondered if these were helpful, the answer is yes, they are extremely so. And they will be appreciated in the coming weeks and months to come as well.

I feel it is important to honor and acknowledge someone's life and I'm glad we are gathered here in this place of natural beauty to honor Terry. I know he would approve of the setting. I'd like to just take a few moments to speak of my brother.  How can you sum up a person’s life in just a few minutes? Well you can't, but I'd like to share with you some observations and fond memories I have. I promise to not go on & on, even though I could, because Terry was such a humble person that he would hate to be the center of attention for too long. But, as his big sister, I must say that if he was listening I would tell him this is important. Even for those who could not be here with us today - but are here in spirit.

This is quite possibly the hardest thing I have ever had to do in my life, so please bear with me. My brother Terry was a smart, kind, generous, compassionate, baseball loving, mild mannered, fearless, a very principled humanitarian, who truly could not hurt another soul. He was a juggler, a rock climber, a bike rider, and a gentle lover of nature. His strong moral compass was developed at a very early age and he lived his life governed by his principles. Those are just some of the ways we could describe him. He was a multi-faceted human being, but probably the strongest sense of my brother is that he was kind to everyone, truly.

Terry was a gentle, peaceful person who I never saw get angry. Now I know this will come as a surprise, especially to those who know me well, but I was the "bossy" one and I know I gave my brother plenty of opportunities to get mad at me while we were growing up. But I cannot remember a single time when he did. Even my cousins, cannot remember him getting mad when, in their own words, ‘we terrorized him’ and my youngest cousin Kamy. And it's true - we did. Well, you know how kids are. But I cannot remember him ever getting mad at us. He just didn't have it in him. He truly was a pacifist in every sense of the word. He was so patient and kind.

Terry was a really happy child growing up. He was also an inquisitive and somewhat mischievous little boy who loved to push buttons, turn knobs and flip switches, of all kinds no matter where. He had quite the reputation for pressing the emergency stop button on store escalators, much to the embarrassment of his mother and older sisters. How fitting that the young boy who loved to press buttons would become a lighting engineer which involved complicated light boards with hundreds of buttons, knobs and switches. It really was the perfect job for Terry.

My brother was very generous and friendly. He could make friends anywhere and did. When he visited me in England one summer, to celebrate his 21st birthday, his goal was to travel up to the northernmost point in Scotland and also to see where they filmed some of the scenes of Chariots of Fire, one of his favorite movies. He accomplished his goal of getting to that most northerly point which takes an amazing amount of ingenuity. There are no trains or public buses that go there. You have to arrange to get on a special postal bus to take you on the last bit of the journey. But he figured that all out and made it.

While he was on this journey he met lots of people, and I know him, he probably spent a lot of his limited funds buying his new friends rounds at the pubs. He ended up coming back to stay with me a bit earlier than expected when his funds ran out. He was still a college student after all. And what are big sisters for, if not for coming to your rescue. While staying with me that summer he got to know my future husband Steve and his 2 sons, Richard & Chris who were, at that time around 10 & 11. Terry ended up becoming their Uncle but in reality I think he was more like an older brother. They really looked up to Terry, he was this tall American college guy and that was a novelty to them. Plus, he could juggle and run and play with them. I know he really enjoyed spending time with them teaching them how to juggle. I can see a lot of similarities between Chris & my brother. They have similar temperaments and parenting styles. And they can both juggle. I had a fun time with Terry that summer showing him around places like the BBC studios in London where we took a special tour together and the Houses of Parliament where we sat in on a session. Terry & I shared a sense of civic responsibility. His focus was on people and mine was the environment.

My brother the humanitarian, would risk his own safety and freedom to help others. While with Amnesty International in the early 90's he volunteered to go to Haiti. This was at the time of a military coup and while he was there a US Naval blockade of the island began, making travel there very dangerous. At great personal risk he went to Haiti to interview the ousted leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and bring his true story back to the US. There was the fear of military death squads and people were disappearing during this time, but my brother was brave and resourceful and accomplished his mission and he made it home safely. I can't tell you the worry this caused us, especially his mother & father, but Terry felt this was important and I was so proud of him for doing what he thought was the right thing to do.

Another example of his generous humanitarian spirit, closer to home, was when he joined with others to bring pizzas to feed the homeless in San Francisco at City Hall ... Evidently this was not a popular thing to do with the city government, as he and the others were promptly arrested. Terry truly was a kind man who would follow his conscience despite the personal risks to himself. 

My brother was also fearless and not the least bit afraid of heights. He was a rock climber who transferred those skills to his work. Those of us who enjoy the Christmas lights in San Francisco, in particular the lights on the tree in Union Square and the special light on top of the TransAmerica Pyramid, can thank my brother, Terry. For many years he was the one who climbed that tall tree in Union Square and up inside to the top of the pyramid to put the lights up during the Christmas season. His bravery to be able to do this always amazed me.
   
Something that might surprise you about Terry, given that he was not overly ambitious or materialistic or competitive, was his prowess at the game Monopoly. He was an excellent Monopoly player. I loved playing games with him, for even when he was beating you he was humble, gentle and never boastful. Our family shares a love of games and our family gatherings usually include them. Dad taught us both how to play chess but Terry was much better than I, and this was something he passed onto his son, Henry, who is quite the junior chess player now. Henry really enjoys playing games, just like his daddy. Terry also liked to play Risk and taught both Henry and Daphne how to play and they enjoyed playing with him. And if you ever got the chance to play Apples to Apples with Terry, well that was a treat. My sister Kathy gave us this game one Christmas and it involves making hilarious comparisons and Terry was always unpredictable and quirky and you could never know which way he would go.

Terry loved baseball and in particular the San Francisco Giants. Thanks to my dad we all developed that same love. I'm so glad he got to see them win not just one World Series, but two. I will always think of Terry when I watch a Giants game. Terry knew a lot about the game and the players and if we were watching a game together I could always count on him to know the answer to any question I would throw at him. He was such a big fan and such a great dad that he took his daughter, Daphne, to the Giants Victory Parade in the city to honor their 2010 World Series title. I’m sure that is a wonderful memory she’ll have forever.

So you see I could go on and on. Terry was a wonderful son, a caring brother, a generous friend, a devoted father and a loving husband. Terry's death was sudden, unexpected and tragic. It is so sad that he died young. Just a couple of days ago I read something that comforted me: 'a person doesn’t have to live a long life for it to be a triumph'. Terry’s triumph was that he made our world a better place, he was deeply loved and admired and he shall truly be missed. But even though we do not have him with us physically, he is only a thought away.

I'd like to close with this from Helen Keller:

 “What we once enjoyed and deeply loved, we can never lose 
for all that we love deeply becomes a part of us.”