Tribute to My Friend

It is with a heavy  heart that I write this blog.

It is in honor of my friend, David F., who just passed away after a grueling battle with brain cancer.

David was a fellow astronomer and in my short time of knowing him (only about 15 years), he became one of my closest friends.  He was always known among our astronomy club (The Saguaro Astronomy Club) as a man of

David at our Sentinel (AZ) star party, 1998

teddy-bear friendliness, youthful enthusiasm, and almost religious devotion to observing the handwork of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He began experiencing minor problems with coordination as early as last October, but the doctors did not think it was anything that warranted alarm.  About Christmas time, he began to experience bad headaches, which the doctors thought might be related to his blood pressure and diabetes.  In January, he began to experience moments of confusion. (It was at this time that he called me one day with tears in his voice– he had just accepted the job as our club’s treasurer– and he told me that he just could not focus on the job, that the doctors were trying to adjust his insulin dosage, and that he wanted to get help with the treasurer’s job. I told him his health mattered more than anything, so we’d find another member to handle the club’s finances.   In fact, two members have stepped forward to co-shoulder that job for now.)

Finally, one day last month, he exhibited very odd behavior before going to his job at a local junior college (where he taught astronomy), and later that morning, his wife got a call from the school that he was in great pain.  She came to get him and took him right to the emergency room where the doctors performed an MRI and discovered two brain tumors.  The one on the front left of his brain was the size of a golf ball and came out cleanly.  But the one at the back of his brain was the size of an orange and had grown tentacles into the surrounding brain tissue.  It was removed, but found to be a stage 4 carcinoma.  This was a death sentence, as the tumor had already seeded itself into the rest of David’s brain, like a creeping weed.

David never regained consciousness.  I visited him twice in the hospital and spoke to him both times, hoping that he could hear me.  He did not make any responses, but one never knows!

M104, David's Favorite Galaxy

The night he passed from us, I was assisting another club member with a star party for his Sunday School class.  A third member was helping us, and at the end of the night, we all decided to aim our telescopes at the galaxy M104, David’s favorite deep-sky object.  We agreed to look at it simultaneously as an act of honor to our friend and hoping that somehow, this act would be significant. Little did we know that at the very hour he was drawing his last breaths.

I pray for strength and grace for his wife and children, and want them to know how much our club in general and I in particular loved and respected David.  He was a class act and will always hold a special place in our hearts.

In am an ardent admirer of the Austrian composer Gustav Mahler.  In the 1890′s, he wrote his Second Symphony, known as “The Resurrection Symphony.” It has 5 movements (an unusual thing for a symphony, but the norm for Mahler). The 4th and 5th movements contain vocal music– the 4th, an alto solo, and the 5th, an awesome and grand chorale finale. I end this blog by quoting the libretto.  If you can find a copy of the 2nd Symphony, you may want to listen to these two movements and you’ll understand why I think Mahler’s symphony is a fitting tribute to my friend:

[Alto]

O red rose!
Man lies in greatest need!
Man lies in greatest pain!
How I would rather be in heaven.
There came I upon a broad path
when came a little angel and wanted to turn me away.
Ah no! I would not let myself be turned away!
I am from God and shall return to God!
The loving God will grant me a little light,
Which will light me into that eternal blissful life!

[Choir]
Rise again, yes, rise again,
Will you My dust,
After a brief rest!
Immortal life! Immortal life
Will He who called you, give you.

To bloom again were you sown!
The Lord of the harvest goes
And gathers in, like sheaves,
Us together, who died.

O believe, my heart, O believe:
Nothing to you is lost!
Yours is, yes yours, is what you desired
Yours, what you have loved
What you have fought for!

O believe,
You were not born for nothing!
Have not for nothing, lived, suffered!

What was created
Must perish,
What perished, rise again!
Cease from trembling!
Prepare yourself to live!

O Pain, You piercer of all things,
From you, I have been wrested!
O Death, You masterer of all things,
Now, are you conquered!

With wings which I have won for myself,
In love’s fierce striving,
I shall soar upwards
To the light which no eye has penetrated!
Its wing that I won is expanded,
and I fly up.
Die shall I in order to live.
Rise again, yes, rise again,
Will you, my heart, in an instant!

Rest well, noble friend.  Oh, the views you now have of M104, and the other incredible displays of God’s handwork! Know that the day will come when we will join you and together, we will re-celebrate our great star parties, this time from observing fields of unbelievable splendor and grandeur!