I spent too little time with Duncan. He never came to official fraternity stuff, which in my naive little mind was what a good brother ought to do. I realize now, years too late, that my few interactions with Duncan were as formative for me as any of the customary collegiate goings-on.
In fact, my most memorable experience with him was from freshman year, an off-campus house party he'd invited me to. It was, it turned out, way off campus. My friends and I stuck out like sore thumbs, wearing fraternity hoodies in a crowd of mohawks and leather jackets with spiked shoulders. Duncan was spinning for the dance club in the attic, the second floor was a punk rock wasteland, and the kitchen was full of obscure hardcore and kegs. We didn't dare venture into the basement. I distinctly remember running from the police, circling the block, and returning to the party. The night ended with one friend passed out on my floor while the rest of us did things that I don't remember distinctly but that certainly weren't bloggable. There was poetry and vomit on the bathroom stall in the morning.
If you don't understand why all this was important, then nothing I say will suffice.
At this point, I will let my friend Ian do the writing. This was originally published in the fraternity's newsletter, and I'm reprinting it here with his okay. I do hope you'll read it.
Although we hadn't seen each other in a year or two, I was invited to Duncan's wedding back in 2002. Because he and his wife-to-be Kris were paying for the wedding themselves, they had to keep the guest list pretty trim and I was lucky to get an invitation. To cinch my spot, I volunteered to be the videographer so they could save the money. At one point, while I was standing in the fountain getting a good angle of the wedding procession, my hand slipped just a fraction of an inch. I barely noticed it at the time, but when they later watched the wedding video, sure enough I had subtly zoomed in on a bridesmaid's chest. I was pretty embarrassed but Duncan and Kris just laughed and said it was a great addition to their wedding. This fit in well with Duncan's take on things. Just a few days before, during the practice ceremony, when Duncan was supposed to take the wedding band out of his pocket and slip it on Kris's hand, instead he brought out a live hamster! I wish I was there to see the priest double over with laugher.
I also wish I was there to help with something, anything, when he was being treated for cancer this past year. Duncan Robert Lowne was my Phi Psi big brother, and (more importantly) I liked and respected him at all times, but for some reason we hadn't been keeping in touch. I first heard that he had terminal brain cancer on the phone with Brother Nick Ippolito.
I got in contact with Duncan's wife, Kris, and she sent me a backlog of emails she had been sending out to Duncan's friends to keep everyone in the loop on his treatment. I shouldn't have been surprised to see that she had been sending out these emails to literally hundreds of people. Duncan touched down not just in Cleveland, but in London, Boston, Seattle, Detroit, Rochester, Japan, you name it.
Wherever he went, people gravitated towards him. I think it's because he spent more time asking new friends about their lives than talking about his own. He was a semi-pro violinist, he raced the police with a car he modified himself, he built robots and sound systems and lofts, he juggled and did martial arts and spoke a dozen languages, he spun music and started a record label (you can still see the "DJ Rathumos" and "Lethargic Records" stickers all over Cleveland), he researched brain functions and could walk on giant wooden cable spools and ... and he lived seven months with the knowledge that he was about to die.
Duncan faced it head-on, and decided on some last things he wanted to do before he passed away, and went about doing them. Along the way, he made it a point of helping his wife and family and friends through it all. He was always thinking of everyone else, and cheering people up with his English-style dry humor. One of his friends sewed him a "Fuck Cancer" pillow that I imagine made him laugh every time he looked at it. He even wanted something fun for his funeral. In an email, he said "... as for a funeral, absolutely NO people wearing black listening to sad organ music, etc. A series of parties is more my style. Maybe get people to spin a few sets. Upbeat attire too, please; no ties or suits! Jean, t-shirts, whatever's comfortable for everyone." So when the time came, his wife Kris traveled the world and organized parties in every city where Duncan had lived, which was quite a lot.
When I found out about the cancer, it took me a week before I got over my anxiety over contacting him. After all, what could I say? -- "Hello Duncan! I heard about the terminal cancer, that's a real bummer!" -- Nope. I racked my brain. I thought about what I'd want to hear if the same thing were happening to me, and I finally wrote him to remind him of some stories I remembered from our friendship, and also some new adventures I'd been in that I knew he would find amusing. He wrote back to say that he had been trying to find me earlier to tell me about all this... and he loved the stories and wanted me to send more... and he apologized but this was all he could type... because due to the cancer his motor skills left him at about two words per minute on the keyboard. I emailed more stories and sent a care package with a lavender neck massage pillow, some new music I thought he'd like, some tea, and a loaf of my best banana bread.
He passed away in England, just a few days before my gift arrived, leaving Kris to open it for nobody. What we should all remember, especially those that read this and have no idea who the hell I'm talking about because they never had the privilege to meet Duncan, is that this is the way to go. Surrounded by friends and his wife Kris and people that really loved him, having done every god-damned thing he could possibly cram into his life before the curtains started closing, he put every bit of energy into making the last days count. If only all of us could do that, every day. Right? This is why I'm so fucking proud of him, and I hope I can do the same when my time comes.
I am absolutely positive Duncan would have wanted me to end this little article with a Latin phrase that we can all take to heart. Te audire no possum, musa sapientum fixa est in aure. Translation: I can't hear you, I have a banana in my ear.
We love you, Duncan.
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