Less than two weeks ago I was at a panel with David Honigsberg (
dochyel) at Lunacon. It was a Friday panel, the other panelists were apparently snowed in somewhere else, and it turned out that the panel was David and I, a deux, by ourselves, discussing religion in SF&F. He asked why there was so little of it in literature, and I said that that was pretty much because any time you opened your yap on the subject you were bound to offend SOMEBODY and wind up loathed and despised. (And if you weren't you had simply not been read by enough people yet.)
"Loathed and despised," he said with glee. "I will make sure I use that phrase often."
In fact, he threatened to shout it at me across crowded hallways for the rest of the con.
Later on in the weekend, he gave a small concert at one of the parties I went to - and I went to bed rather later than I wanted to, sitting up and fighting tiredness just so that I could be there and listen to him sing. and play his guitar.
He was so full of LIFE, dammit.
I cannot believe that a man so full of heart can be let down by his own, at such a young age.
I haven't known him well, or long. But I will remember him with affection and respect.