Posts Tagged ‘Shawn’

  1. 2007 – The Year in Review

    January 3, 2008 by ChiaLynn

    2008, I almost said… I’m getting ahead of myself.

    It’s been a strange, sad, joyful year for me, and while some things, I hope never to repeat, other things (one thing in particular) made it one of the best years of my life.

    Were-Dan of London

    In March, NovySan and I went to London and Stratford-Upon-Avon, where we visited old friends, met new friends, saw F. Murray Abraham in The Merchant of Venice and Ian McKellen in King Lear, drank at the Dirty Duck, ate at Lee Ho Fook’s, wandered Hyde Park, visited the Tower, Tower Bridge and the Temple, and picked up a signed copy of Donald Rumbelow’s Jack the Ripper book at the end of his Jack the Ripper tour. I could go on for days about this trip. Definitely one of the high points.

    And then, in April, I got sick. High fever, sore throat, hacking cough… Your basic horrible plague. And I stayed sick for about six weeks, through three rounds of antibiotics, chest x-rays, prescription inhalers… I think it’s the sickest I’ve ever been, and I very much hope that it’s the sickest I ever am.

    Dan&Chia 7-7-2007 1-25-22 PM

    July, though! Oh, July made the entire year worth it. On July 7, NovySan and I got married. I knew the day I met him that I wanted him in my life. It didn’t take me much longer to know I wanted him in my life for the rest of my life. I love you, baby.

    In August, Lindsay Holichek died, of undiagnosed, and apparently asymptomatic, ovarian cancer. I always thought of Lindsay as my parents’ friend, but she was mine, too. She called herself my surrogate mother – I was more her surrogate daughter. Just a few weeks before she died, I was looking at one of the (many) books she’d given me and thinking that I should write to her. I didn’t, and of course it’s too late now. It wasn’t until after she died that I realized how strongly she’d influenced me. She was my mentor before I understood what that meant. She gave me my first copy of Tatterhood and Other Tales, which nurtured my love of fantastic literature and helped spark my feminism. (There’s a reason it’s the first book I ever gave Novy’s daughter.) She loved food and music and she had a beautiful mind and an amazing talent for gift-giving. She always chose just the right thing. It’s something I’ve tried to emulate (with, I flatter myself, some small degree of success). I’ll miss her, but as my mother (ever wise) said, Lindsay enjoyed her life, and she died quickly, painlessly, and doing something she loved. It’s a sad thing, but not a tragedy.

    Self-portrait, with mask and dust

    The end of August brought Burning Man. Our third year, and the first we’ve camped with other people. It was a good year. The early Burn didn’t affect us – I called the event post-Paul Addis “Christmas in Whoville.” I loved the wind and the dust. Something about that harsh environment speaks to me, at least one week out of the year. (Of course, I know that without Novy’s engineering skills, I’d be a miserable huddled wreck underneath someone’s car, instead of laughing at the storms from the safety of our shade structure). The Temple Burn was magical for me – life-changing, I think. There are things I could complain about, but I won’t. I think the beauty of the event is that almost everyone can find an experience there that’s right for them, and I don’t choose to have an experience in which the crowds and the bad behavior overwhelm the generosity, artistic expression and communal feeling I’m there for. I don’t know that I’ll want to keep going every year, but I cherish the years I have been.

    On November 30, my friend Shawn died. I’ve written about this before. Novy and I went to Portland in December for his memorial – met his friend Linda and his partner John. I’m glad we went. Meeting them, and talking to them, helped answer some questions for me, though it raised new ones, as well. There’s so much about his death that I still don’t understand, and of course he’s not here for me to ask. This was one of the low points. Shawn suffered terribly – not just at the end, but his entire life. So many people loved him, but it wasn’t enough. He’d been so damaged, I don’t know what any of us could have done to save him.

    And that brings us, roughly, to the turn of the year, which Novy and I spent with Amara and friends. I’ve got more to say about 2008, but I’ll leave it now with a wish, a hope, a prayer – I’m almost afraid to call it a certainty – that this is going to be a very good year.

    Category Eat, Drink & Be Merry, Friends, Holidays, Los Angeles, Love, Random Babbling, Travel | Tags: ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, | No Comments

  2. The first call came at 1:44 PM

    November 30, 2007 by ChiaLynn

    John, calling to tell me that Shawn’s friend Linda (who I believe took him to the doctor a few months ago) was with him, and said he was dying.

    He called again at 2:59 to confirm — liver failure, kidney failure… While he was still conscious, he said he didn’t want life support, but he’d let John decide. John made the same decision I would have — he had them remove the breathing tube.

    I decided I was flying up there, and called NovySan to tell him. He suggested I wait until I knew whether there was anything I could do — whether there’d be a memorial — whether the family was coming. (The family… John had already called one sister, and left a message. She hasn’t called back. I asked if he’d called Shawn’s brother. He didn’t recognize the name. So I found the number and left a message with Scott’s wife. She hasn’t called, either.) I called John at 3:37 and said I was going to wait. He said it didn’t look like I’d be able to get there before Shawn passed; I said I thought as much, so anything I could do up there, I’d be doing for him. Then he put the phone to Shawn’s ear, so I could tell him I loved him. I hope he could hear me.

    At 4:21, I called my mother. I had to tell someone who knew him.

    John called again at 6:02. He said, “He’s gone.”

    At 6:06, Mom called. “I had a feeling,” she said.

    She was right.

    I hadn’t talked to him in more than four months. I hadn’t even told him that Lindsay, my parents’ friend, my mentor, someone he knew too, died before Burning Man. I keep asking myself why I didn’t call — and whether I would have known how sick he was if I had called. I wonder why I didn’t realize… And I feel even worse for John and his friends in Portland, who were there and still didn’t know.

    I feel hollow. When I say, “Shawn’s dead,” I start to cry. But then it drifts away, because it’s real yet.

    And I’m angry, too. With him, for apparently drinking himself to death at the age of 36. With myself, for not figuring out that that’s what he was doing.

    Really, though, he joins my grandmother on my list of people who’ve died of depression. She treated hers with pills. He treated his with booze.

    (And I hesitate to say for sure it’s the alcohol that killed him — but when I asked John, he said that was it.)

    I don’t know how to say goodbye to him yet.

    Category Friends | Tags: ,,, | 3 Comments

  3. Phone Call You Never Expect…

    November 29, 2007 by ChiaLynn

    I almost never pick up my landline. Usually, if it rings, it’s someone trying to sell me something. But it rang around noon, and that made me wonder — when did I last check my answering machine? Before Thanksgiving, at least… So I wandered in to check the machine, just in time to hear, “Hi, Chia. It’s John — Shawn’s boyfriend. Shawn’s in the hospital. ICU, actually.”

    Of course I picked up.

    His liver is failing. They don’t know why yet. He went to the hospital yesterday. They put him in ICU when his blood pressure dropped dangerously low.

    John called again later. He said Shawn’s stable, but unconscious. He’s on a respirator, because he didn’t react well to something they did to him. His esophagus is badly damaged. But, they expect he’ll make a full recovery.

    I’m irrationally angry at myself, because I haven’t talked to him since before the wedding, in July. It must be worse for John, who lives with him and didn’t know how sick he was.

    All I can do is wait to hear more news. And pray.

    Category Friends | Tags: ,, | No Comments