Dan,
I hate to be the one to pass on this news if you’re not aware yet. I came home to find Keith’s obituary in the Caller-Times today. It says he passed away in Austin, so at least he was in a good place with close connections to the good place up above. My heart goes out to you as you mourn a man who obviously meant a great deal to you. Here’s the link for more info:  Corpus Christi Caller-Times – ObituariesÂÂ
Again, I’m very sorry for your loss.ÂÂ
Sincerely, Peg
S********
AKA BornRed
Corpus Christi, TX
You had a restless mind and a loving heart, Keith Johnston. Please say a prayer, if that’s your bag.
The fact is, I wasn’t as good a friend as I might have been.
The last time I spoke to him, he needed several minutes of oxygen between phrases. It felt too cruel to call too much. He was very touched by your regards, and by Thor’s monkey in particular.
Oh, Burrhog. I hope you know we all cared very much.
That is terrible news indeed, even if foreseeable. My condolences to Keith’s family and to those — like Dan — who knew him better than I.
Godspeed, Burrhog. Save us a seat, will you?
Too, too young.
Dan:
Remember, none of us do enough. Isn’t there always more that we could do?
Last week I lost a very dear family member & though I was with her literally every moment I could be in these last weeks, I still regret not being with her more over the years.
It’s just part of the package, brother.
Thanks, Cowboy. I know that.
Sorry about your situation, too.
It’s like old Emerson said: “The only sin is limitation.”
Memory eternal.
To Burrhog – We are worse off now, but better off for having known you.
Dan, and Cowboy – My condolences.
Dear Cowboy- my sympathies. You are so right.
Thanks, JD. Hope the exile is supportable.
I’m sorry to hear this, Dan. My best.
Thanks, J, but congratulations to Burrhog are more in order, I think.
He suffered in order to stay here consciously as long as he could.
He was a person of significant abilities who would have liked more time for significant accomplishments. I never perceived that he felt particularly sorry that it was happening to him rather than someone else. Envy was not a portion of his character. He had great humility and generosity.
He was sorted to a pip. He’d decided what was important to him, and what he meant.
Very beautiful guy.
Dan,
You told me you dreamt of Keith, maybe even on the same night his spirit left his earthly body. I had two friends who died as the 70’s became the 80’s; one at 23 by suicide, the other at 25 by gunshot wounds inflicted by his own father. Over the years, the two of them (and others) have come to me regularly in dreams, and we all go off and play together again.
What I really want to to say is that I foresee many pleasant memories for you. Just pay attention to those dreams, now that you have this new angel on your shoulder.
Thanks, BornRed.
It’s a strange thing, but I find that as I get older, I remember my dreams more.
I hope I do. It’s funny, too, because until today, I only ever saw a photo of Keith in a wheel chair. It’s one of those things where the person in the dream doesn’t necessarily look like the person in life, but you just know who it is.
Dan – the exile is drawing to a close. We should be back in our home soon. Not done, but inhabitable.
You really are a good guy.
This makes me so sad. Lot of that going around lately.
To absent commrades.
This makes me so sad. Lot of that going around lately.
No kidding. My friends have been dropping like flies lately, on line and off.
Green grass and high tides, my friend.
I’m bummed. I know we all have to go. But shit. That dude was cool. I was most saddened by his first letter wherein he felt a bit alone and somewhat a burden to his family because of the suddeness and seriousness of his illness. I hope his last days were as rich and full as he had planned them to be.
By the time I have to say goodbye I’m counting on Jeff having a cockslappy message board up and running in the afterlife. I’ll be very disppointed if there’s no PW in heaven, and if it’s hosted in heaven it better have high-speed access for those of us who have to log-on from down below.
I’m afraid those who have to log on from down below will be stuck with my site instead.
Sorry, it’s just the breaks.
I tried to reach the group through jeff proteinwisdom.com on Feb 20th. The email bounced.
I just wanted to tell you that he had passed away that morning. The freindships he had made on this site meant a lot to him. Your generosity and caring even awed him a bit. This site, the friendships, the discussions, meant a lot to him.
I will in the near future build up a site and share his memoirs and some of his photographs. If you didn’t know he was a gifted animal/nature photographer. Even toward the end we would walk out in the morning and try to find a subject for him to work on. We enjoyed horse racing together (this email address is the one he would use to correspond with me on horse races).
I missed some of his later treks into Big Bend. If you have never been there he would highly recommend it. Along with Ruidoso. Two places he greatly enjoyed. If you spend some time there sit and smell and look around, you’ll understand. Climb the trails and meet the people, that’s what he did.
I am so lucky, born in the US and my brother was Keith (BurrHog).
Thanks Again.
I was really upset when I had heard about keith. I shared a studio with him at TAMU-CC as an undergraduate in the early 90’s and then worked with him in the same gallery in NYC for two years. He was as gifted in the arts as he was in spirit. He had a knack for using just the right phrase (his own of course) at just the right time. Made us all laugh. Introduced me to Ken Kesey and the marvel of marbles. Keith, we are gonna miss you a alot, and damned glad to have known you. My best to his family and friends. Joe Pena