“When a great life sets,

it leaves an afterglow on the sky

far into the night.” ~ Austin O’Malley

 

On June 18^th of 2012, when I originally wrote and posted this tribute’s opening chapter on grief & grieving, I had no idea that it was on that very day that medical examiners had finally been able to positively identify the body of my dear brother, Todd … I actually found out about his death the next day.

 

Todd truly was, in the words of his father, “a mountain of a man and a gentle Soul”.  If I were to make a list of all my “best friends” and all the people who have had the most profound influence on my own life, Todd would clearly reside at the very pinnacle of that accounting … I still find myself missing him terribly at times, and still find myself saddened by humanity’s loss of yet another Great Soul.

That having been said, I believe fully in honoring lives as they pass, and Todd’s life was as majestic as they come — His Love for the planet and those around him was as immense as the heavens. He was, by all forms of reckoning, a truly GREAT MAN, and I would be remiss if I were not to share some of his life with you all.

 

I don’t know if there is an objective “meaning” to life and death. And yet I most certainly do know that we have all been given the great gift of being able to give life & death Meaning; in part by remembering the lessons that the departed have left behind, and by applying that Wisdom in our relationships that still remain.

 

As such, in honor of my dear departed brother, I will be sharing with all of you much of what Todd taught me — what he taught me while he was alive, and what he taught me in how (and possibly why) he chose to die.

And with that said, it is enough to start with the latter — his death …

 

It is unclear exactly when he chose to take his own life (the medical examiners estimate that he passed on sometime between the end of 2010 and the mid-months of 2011), and yet that he did so is now seemingly beyond doubt.  His skeletal remains were discovered in the Gomez Peak area of the Gila National Forest (located just north of Silver City, New Mexico) in January of 2012.  He had apparently been living in the wilderness for a time before his death (his campsite-home was found roughly two miles from his remains), and it was clear that his decision to end his life was one that was well thought-through & conscious … His body, along with the shotgun he had used to take his own life, was found in a part of the wilderness that was so beautiful that those who found him said they could do nothing at first but stand in silent awe.

“There is no single best kind of death.

A good death is one that is simply ‘right’.

It is a death in which the hand of the way of dying

slips easily into the glove of the act itself.

It is somehow in character …

It, the death, somehow fits the person who has died.”

~ inspired by E. Schneidman

 

Whenever someone commits suicide, it is commonplace to hear the exclamation “What a waste”.  And yet if you are tempted to utter this phrase now, please think again. This was no spontaneous choice that Todd made – it was obvious to those who found his body that he had picked the spot purposefully.  And neither was his death some frivolously emotional response to a single bout of the blues. Todd had suffered from clinical depression (and later, bipolar schizophrenia, if not something akin to multiple-personality disorder) for over two decades before his passing.  Not wanting to “turn into a zombie”, he had repeatedly refused medications that could have “helped” his plight.  He fought valiantly against his demons — a fight that I was blessed to witness first-hand when we lived together on the Big Island of Hawaii for the first several months of 2008.  As such, after waging a battle with “the Darkness” that can only be described as “epic”, I see his choice of departure from this world as what it probably was; as an act of courage, even though certainly not the act of courage for which I had hoped.

In his “real Todd” moments, he was and remains the Kindest human I have ever met — a true “gentle and jovial giant”. Indeed, I am certain, if the world were filled with “true Todds”, that there would be no more war, that hunger & poverty would cease to exist, and that our beautiful Earth would be cherished & revered in the gentle & Respect-full way it should.

In the following few pages of this memorial, I will be sharing some of my most precious memories of Todd with you.  And as you read them, please know that — despite the pulsing sadness that still resides within me today, I am more resolved than ever to go forth and honor Todd’s great life by living a great and joyful life of my own — a life of Kindness … a life of Caring … a life of Service … a life of Love.

And now this is all that is left — for me to know that Todd is within me still, and to go forth in his honor to be the change he so desperately wanted to See.

 

“Death can only separate those who Love each other so far as their lower vehicles are concerned; the man living on earth, blinded by matter, feels separated from those who have passed onwards, but, in actuality, there is no such separation. Those who have passed on physically are with us still; all around us … in everything we see.” ~ inspired by Annie Wood-Besant

“To live in hearts in hearts we leave behind, 
is not to die.” ~ Thomas Campbell

“The living is a passing traveler;
The death, a man come Home.”~ Li Bai

Filed under: A Tribute to Todd by Scaughdt