Goodbye, Beloved Friend

Cthulhu the cat died today.

He was, strange as it may seem to anyone who isn't a "cat person," one of my best friends.

Of all living things, none were less deserving of his ordeal than Cthulhu. He was truly incapable of malice, never depressed except when he was dying, and always there to spread love and cheer. For eight years I relied on him to help cheer me up when nothing else could, and to shower me with affection even when I was being a moody jerk that didn't necessarily deserve it.

I've had a number of cats in my life, and I've loved them all. But Cthulhu was special. He was my familiar, my shadow. Before he got sick, every time I walked in the door he would come running to me. He would follow me, craning his neck to look up at me with his saucer eyes and an expectant look. Cynics insisted that he just wanted to be fed, until they saw him ignore food in favor of a visit to my lap -- or my shoulder. And not for a momentary visit before rushing off to eat, either. Cthulhu would sometimes spend over an hour on my lap before eating, and would often return immediately afterwards.

When I would walk around the house, he'd often follow me. If he was particularly in the mood for affection, he'd hug my legs with his paws (and try to climb me like a tree). His head-butts of love were extremely enthusiastic, as were his licks. He kneaded me like bread and purred so loud and low that people occasionally mistook him for some sort of distant machinery. My beard was for chewing, and occasionally so was my nose. Cthulhu really was a love cat.

And you never realize quite just how much something means to you until it's gone. I feel guilty for every time I did anything other than spend time petting Cthulhu and basking in his affection, because now I never again can do that. Waking up and not finding him running alongside me down the hallway, looking up at me lovingly in anticipation of cuddles, was already hard enough when he was sick. Now that he's gone, it's even harder.

His unconditional love was unlike anything I've ever known or ever will. We humans with our big brains all love conditionally -- we can't help it, we're made to be judgmental and demanding. The love of a great pet isn't superior to that of a human friend or loved-one, but it is qualitatively different in that it really comes with no strings attached. It's just about togetherness and nothing else. Cats don't care about anything you have or haven't done wrong, they don't want favors, and they have no expectations of you beyond the basics: food, shelter, and affection.

We are about to have a baby, and people say of course this will make it clear that the love of a cat isn't as important as that of your child. Of course it isn't.

But I say of course because as a human I'm wired to be a speciesist, favoring my own kind over all others reflexively, and especially ones that have substantial proportions of genes in common with me.

If I look at it more objectively, what is so inferior about the love of a cat? We're all animals. Cats are small, but so are children, for a while. Cats can't talk, but we love our children before they can talk. Cats and children are both small and mostly helpless against the many large dangers of the world, yet more resilient and clever than we often give them credit for. Cats don't live as long as we do, but we still love people who die young. In fact, we love them more because we long for that extra time together we never got to have. I long for more time with Cthulhu that I can never have.

So of course one doesn't love a cat as much -- at least not in the same way -- as one loves a child, or any other family member. But I am not ashamed to call it a close second.

Cthulhu was an integral part of our lives for eight years. Without Cthulhu here, things are jarringly different, and not in a good way. He's always been in this house with us, we got married when we already had him, his presence was always felt in our lives and now that it's gone the absence is markedly palpable.

My morning coffee ritual, and my evening coming home and dinner rituals, were all centered around Cthulhu. As I walk down the hallway to the kitchen, he is no longer running along side me, craning his little neck to look up at me expectantly all the way. Nobody now sits patiently at my feet waiting for me to finish eating -- only to jump on my lap the instant I'm done. No longer is each meal capped by aggressive snuggling, head-butts punctuated by loud purrs, a kitty head shoved into my underarm, and a mad scramble onto my shoulders to nuzzle my cheeks and lick my ears. These daily routines now seem hollow and pedestrian, which they actually are without an outpouring of kitty love to liven them up.

I still subconsciously look around, expecting to see him running over to share the love, or taking a nap somewhere comfortable.

I wish he had lived long enough to meet the baby, so that she'd have known this most wonderful cat, this living personification of unconditional love.

The other cats are wonderful in their own ways, but only Sim is a lap cat. And none of them have that outgoing, loving personality that always brightened our days. Our household cuddling and happiness quotients just dropped markedly. It will be some time before they go back up at all, and they'll never reach the same soaring heights they did when Cthulhu was still alive.

Even when he was suffering, he could be coaxed into purring and licking and being happy to see us -- until the end, when he just couldn't take it anymore. No creature, and especially not one so wonderful, should have to go through that. Those that believe in some divinity should ask their God why such an innocent creature, absent of malice of any kind, bringing nothing but love and joy to all who encountered him, deserved to suffer so greatly and die so young. But I can tell you the answer already -- there is no reason for it. It is just wrong.

Born feral, blinded by deformed corneas, and mostly toothless his whole life, Cthulhu was unlikely to survive more than a few weeks had the Beckers not found him. We were extremely lucky that such a wonderful creature then found his way to us when they could not keep him. Despite his lifelong physical difficulties, Cthulhu shrugged off the adversity and didn't hold it against the world. He could have been ornery and mean and nobody would have begrudged him that, but instead he was the most affectionate creature I've ever met.

I keep getting up to go check on him and give him reassurance and petting, only to realize he's not there anymore and never will be again. Eventually the sheer momentum of the trying to be there for him as much as possible, to try to do something that would save him, will wear off -- but the cat-shaped void left by his death will always remain.

They were eight great years with Cthulhu around, but eight was not enough. Maybe I'll eventually stop crying whenever I think about him. I certainly hope so, because there are so many joyous memories of him to be cherished.

I wish he could have lived forever. He was supposed to eat the universe, not the other way around. That's why we named him Cthulhu, God damn it.

Edward Gorman, part 1

I just found out that a friend of mine for over 20 years, Ed Gorman, died recently. He was born in 1918, served as an officer in the Pacific theater in WWII, was one of the pioneers of marketing to the youth demographic, and was active in local politics for decades.

So he had a good long run, but I am still quite sad. He will be missed.

A couple of articles about him:
http://tinyurl.com/y87bt3s
http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20096103,00.html

And a short article by him:
http://tinyurl.com/ygvz4nq

His autobiography "An American Education" is very hard to find (it was published by a tiny vanity press), but a very interesting read if you can find it.

Ed helped me out quite a bit, especially when I was a teenager. We met when he was helping raise money from the community for me to go to the U.S.S.R. as part of a math and physics student summer exchange program, and also helped me get a Rose Foundation grant for computer equipment when I was in college. We remained friends, and I have always had a great time chatting with him, hearing his stories and getting advice from him. I will miss him quite a bit.

Michael Jackson Dead

The King of Pop, and possibly the most famous person in the world, has died. It is unfortunate when anyone passes, especially for their friends and family. However, the adulation heaped upon dead celebrities, and the media frenzy that accompanies it, makes the event subject to critique in ways the private mourning of the family isn't. Though I still fondly remember Thriller (mainly for its excellent use of Vincent Price), the rest of Michael Jackson's career (both as a musician and a circus freak) had long ago ceased to interest me in any way. It is sad that he died so young, and it will be intriguing and perhaps even amusing to observe the inevitable process of Elvisification. But despite Jackson's tragic life and untimely death, personally I was much more effected by the passing of Ragnarok the Cat. Jackson's contributions to pop music, and pop culture (especially celebrity tabloid fare), are undeniable and worthy of a nod -- but the same can be said of so many deceased artists, many of whose work was more meaningful to me personally than was Jackson's. I wish that rather than heaping all the praise and remembrance upon superstars like Jackson, some of that attention could be shared amongst more of those incredible talents who passed in relative obscurity.

Farewell Furry Friend

Ragnarok the cat was born in 1993, and passed away a few weeks ago at almost exactly 16 years of age. He and his sister Thelema were born to my friend Jason's cat Döden, and traveled with us across country from NY to CA in 1993. At truck stops along the way we'd do our shopping each with a kitten in his pocket. Ragnarok and Thelema were my constant companions from 1993-2001, when the demise of Webmind, Inc. forced me to send Ragnarok and Thelema to live with my Mom and sister Janine on Long Island. He spent eight happy years with them, staying there even after my Mom convinced me to let them continue living with here even after Anu treated her cat allergies.

Ragnarok was an impressive hunter, often bringing offerings of dead rodents to my door. He also enjoyed being a lap cat, sitting for hours on my lap or my mom's while we worked on the computer or watched TV (especially as he got older and less able to hunt). Anyone who isn't a "cat person" will probably find an obituary for a cat to be ridiculous, but Ragnarok and Thelema were with me during some very difficult periods of my life, and went on to keep my Mom company during some not necessarily great times for her, as well, and Ragnarok's head-nudges and soothing purr will be missed by all who knew him.

R.I.P. Studs Terkel

The great Studs Terkel, author, oral historian, radio personality, social activist, and unashamed Liberal, passed away yesterday at 96.

I wish I'd had the opportunity to get to know him, but I know his work, and it has been a great inspiration to me as a writer and social activist. Terkel's books, especially Race, The Good War, Working, and Hard Times, helped shape my understanding of our nation. Though my own working class upbringing exposed me to a variety of characters in many different life situations, my family rarely left New York when I was a kid. Studs Terkel's books gave me glimpses into the worlds of people outside our region, and across generations. Even though I am also a voracious reader of more "objective" academic histories, the personal narratives in Terkel's works made history and biography even more engaging.

He led a long, full life, but his passing is still a great loss. The literary world will never be the same, as there are currently few, if any, writers following in his footsteps as oral historians and chroniclers of working class culture.

David Foster Wallace

Brilliant writer David Foster Wallace, an inspiration to a whole generation of emerging writers, took his life Sept. 12th, 2008.



The choice of Sept. 12th certainly resonates. Each Sept. 12th, after the numbness of another Sept. 11th of remembrance wears off, I am left contemplating a whole host of personal and political quandaries, a pile of vexing questions about the whys of the world and the seemingly ever-failing quest for mutual understanding between both persons and people. I didn't know him, but I can imagine the possibility that Wallace had similar feelings conjured up by this inauspicious date. Wallace's desperate portrayals of the world in his work, commented upon already by others such as Salon's Laura Miller who noted the "increasing darkness" of Wallace's writing, was a perfectly reasonable response to observing the society around him.

It's even understandable to me that someone with so much to offer could have possibly felt quite the opposite. Feeling that way is pretty much par for the course in an overpopulated, overstimulated world. The profound lack of understanding and compassion displayed by too many people makes it simple to feel like an insignificant voice, one which conveys nothing but one's own failure and fraudulence, particularly when one has chosen to dedicate themselves to communicating emotions and ideas to others.

There is conjecture that Wallace felt this way, based particularly on Wallace's "Good ol' Neon," -- as well as the opposite feeling that to believe this is to deny the ability of Wallace to look beyond himself in his writing. People are complex, the trite observation goes. Writers put a bit of themselves into everything they write. I can fully understand the uncertainty about where the observation about the world ends, and the observation about oneself begins.

What I can't understand, because to do so could bring disastrous consequences, is making that final choice to accept as real whatever form of imagined defeat he must have been feeling. It is even sadder than the world in which nonexistence can seem -- even for a fleeting moment -- to be a superior option to existence, that a single instant can be so irreversible, can so easily turn a glorious hero into a tragic one, and thus deprive the world of someone with so much left to give to it.

Motherfuckin' Fuck

R.I.P. George Carlin

Awesome, offensive, say-it-like-it-is comic and social commentator George Carlin, heir to the throne of Lenny Bruce, passed away today. It's a fuckin' tragedy, that's what it is.

"We're all fucked. It's important to remember that." -- George Carlin

As the reigning king of bitterly sarcastic cynics, Carlin's bullshit detector was always ferreting-out the world's idiocies and hypocracies for ridicule. Like Mark Twain before him, though, Carlin knew that he himself was one of the flawed morons we call humanity. This willingness to stand amongst the thronging crowd and observe its foibles from within are what made his acerbic wit all the more honest, biting, and incisive.

"The very existence of flame-throwers proves that some time, somewhere, someone said to themselves, You know, I want to set those people over there on fire, but I'm just not close enough to get the job done." -- George Carlin

As with Bukowski, George Carlin was an inspiration for all drunken, misanthropic atheists held back by a world overrun with the foolishly optimistic. Carlin made people laugh in order to make them think, to question assumptions, to not just take consensus reality at face value. He didn't purport to have all the answers, but he asked a lot of hilarious questions which cut to the quick many of our most foolish sacred cows. He will be missed.

"Death is caused by swallowing small amounts of saliva over a long period of time." -- George Carlin

Update: Anu pointed me at a really interesting, extensive George Carlin interview, seemingly the last one he ever did. The Onion AV Club interview is decent, Salon did two interviews with him, and a fan page has a reprint of a vintage Playboy interview that is quite interesting.

Ollie Johnston: Another Great Gone

The last of Disney's legendary "Nine Old Men" of animation, Ollie Johnston, has passed away. This is another "truly, the end of an era" moment. Of course, those are inevitable (especially coming out of a century where so much amazing work in art, science, technology and politics happened in so little time), but they are always sad nonetheless.

For those of you who may not know, Johnston was one of the prime movers at Disney behind American animation. He was a master animator who was instrumental in the making of Snow White, Fantasia, Bambi, Pinnochio, Cinderella, and a whole slew of other classic Disney films. He was also the author, with long-time cohort Frank Thomas, of several books including The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation, the classic book on animation.

I promise I'll blog again about something other than obituaries and illnesses soon, but right now I'm really busy working on a script rewrite (which happens to center around death and illness) so these are the only events catching enough my attention lately to bother blogging about.

More Sad News: Anthony Minghella has also died

Too many interesting folks passing away lately, and I'm starting to suffer from tribute exhaustion. Anthony Minghella, the writer-director responsible for such fine films as "The English Patient" and "The Talented Mr. Ripley" died from surgical complications.

Minghella's work was very poetic, both textually and visually, and yet at the same time accessible to a wider audience. His films were very emotionally engaging, and he was able to coax amazing performances from his actors. I never had an opportunity to meet him, but his reputation as a nice guy is confirmed by folks at work who had. He died much too young, and he will be missed.

Arthur C. Clarke Has Died

Frankly, I'm quite depressed at having to write about the death of yet another childhood hero so soon after the death of Gary Gygax. Arthur C. Clarke, prolific sci-fi author and futurist, passed away today. At 90, this was less of a blow than Gygax's untimely departure, but it is still a tragic loss.

Clarke and Kubrick's film "2001: A Space Odyssey" was a major influence, one that inspired me both in my work in computing and artificial intelligence, and my work in filmmaking. I read a number of Clarke's books in my youth, and works like Childhood's End, Rendezvous With Rama, and The Songs Of Distant Earth influenced me greatly. His idea for geosynchronous satellites, published in a 1945 issue of Wireless World, has influenced all of global society greatly. Clarke's works were integral in helping to form my life as a philosopher, a gamer (and game developer), a writer, and an engineer. With Clarke's passing, an era of Sci-Fi comes a giant step closer to closure. Not many of his generation remain, and with them will pass a less cynical era of Sci-Fi than much of contemporary fare. Sure, I also enjoy cynical cyberpunk material as well, but writers like Clarke had takes on our future -- with an interesting mix of both positive and negative possibilities -- that are still worth contemplating.

Clarke, through 2001 in particular, was hugely influential on Sci-Fi in popular culture. Generations of filmmakers, writers, and video game designers all owe a huge debt of gratitude to Clarke (and Kubrick) for bringing cerebral Sci-Fi to a mass market. Rubber Monsters and Rayguns schlock may be fun, but Clarke and his contemporaries helped open doors for a more intelligent kind of Sci-Fi. Anyone working in AI, telecommunications, general computing, video games, and sci-fi filmmaking, comics or writing should take a moment to give thanks to Arthur C. Clarke for all he has done for the world.

A Sad Day For Nerds The World Over

Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, has died. At only 69, he died too young. It is a sad day indeed (personally, I cried).

For me, Gary's passing is much more personal than the recent passing of William F. Buckley. Though I respected Mr. Buckley's writing abilities, my own personal development has been influenced far more by D&D than by conservativism. Much of my earliest writing came in the form of writing adventures, and creating extensive histories for my characters, for D&D (and then AD&D, and then all manner of non-Gygax games like Twilight 2000, Traveller, GURPS, Cyberpunk, Shadowrun, Paranoia, etc.) Text-based role playing games were the first large computer programs I wrote, on my trusty Commodore 64 (a machine that is as nostalgic to me as a box of dusty AD&D manuals).

Back in those days a role playing campaign could span a year of weekends, all of us hunkered down in one of our parents' living rooms, and it wasn't uncommon to own the same computer for five years. We committed to our gaming for the long term, and as such we evolved rich stories and complex characters. In college, much of my first couple years were spent playtesting the homebrewed gaming system that became a college friend's undergraduate thesis project.

I not only learned a lot about creative thinking, and writing, from role playing games -- but also about data management, the psychology of rule adherence, and negotiation. D&D was full of arcane rules and tables of data (which, honestly, most players learned to ignore after trying them out a couple times). Understanding how and why rules came to be abrogated, annulled, or redefined during innumerable role playing sessions -- and taking part in many negotiations regarding these issues -- has given me a deep, functional understanding of the psychology of rules. This has been very useful both in my management roles, as well as helping me better understand the nuanced pragmatics of politics and the legal system.

Though I haven't played a AD&D (or any other non-computer RPG) in years, role playing games were a huge part of my formative years. I can honestly say I learned far more about creative thinking from playing role playing games than from any class I took in school. Like John August, I have also been unable to separate from my box of D&D books over all these years. Occasionally, in a fit of nostalgia, I buy one of the rare ones I "always wanted" on eBay. I still harbor some notion that I may play again someday, and while I doubt that will ever come to pass, there is as much nostalgia-for-my-youth comfort in knowing that I could if I wanted to as there is in eating New York Pizza, listening to Pink Floyd, or watching A Christmas Story.

Gary Gygax, and the industry he helped create, really did help foster the imaginations, and encourage the development of valuable writing and negotiating skills, of generations of nerds all around the world. I also believe D&D helped pave the way for the success of things like Harry Potter, World of Warcraft, and even the resurgence of The Lord Of The Rings.

But even that's not the whole story, as D&D and things like it have an even greater impact. Fantasy and Science Fiction stories, and games, aren't just an escape from reality but also a clarion call to try to make reality a better place. Not only writers and artists, but also astronauts, scientists, engineers, etc. frequently cite Star Trek, D&D, and similar F&SF fare as inspirations for their quests to make the world a better place.

And Gary Gygax did indeed inspire legions of nerds in their quest to make the world a better place. He will be missed.