fleetfootmike (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fleetfootmike) wrote2011-11-21 11:45 am
fleetfootmike) wrote2011-11-21 11:45 am
Re: "Man, 55"
The itch wouldn't go away, so in the end I bit the bullet and emailed the editor.
Just had an email back that said:
I've sorted out the latter request (thanks to Kirstin T), but here's what I wrote:
"Man, 55..."
Mid-afternoon on Thursday 10th November, there was a fatal three-way car accident near Wing. I'm well aware that whatever the Herald staffer who reported it was restricted in what they could say by the nature of the accident, and I'd in no way want them or anyone else to take the following as a criticism of that necessarily bare report.
However, let me tell you and your readers a little about the person whose life was ended in that accident, and try and explain why it seems so.. unfair is the only word I can find... that for most of your readers, all they would ever know of him is "Man, 55". Another statistic, another sad sigh and a turn of the page.
His name was Christopher Croughton, but his friends, and he had many, knew him as "Keris", for reasons that I suspect many of us never learned. Had you met him, short, bearded, bespectacled, somewhat rotund and balding, you'd probably have guessed that he was a computer programmer. And you'd have been right.
In it's own way, though, that's no more of a summary than 'man, 55'. Keris was also, among other things, a talented singer, musician and sound engineer. He was responsible for the management of some bits of the Internet in the UK, as well as being a radio amateur, a lover of good whisky and an avid fan and reader of science fiction.
But sometimes, the measure of a man is in how he's remembered. When news of Keris' death came out amongst his friends, people from as far afield as San Francisco and Toronto, through the length and breadth of the UK, to places in Germany, each found they had a story to tell. And most of them focussed on one thing: his quiet, unstinting generosity.
He would ask friends if they needed a lift to some function, and in conversation later it would transpire that he'd quite deliberately stayed at a Travelodge to facilitate this. And would shrug it off with a smile, and the explanation that it meant he got to have porridge for breakfast, and he liked porridge.
Several people recall him offering to help them move stuff, and asking cheerfully, "will it fit in a car, or will you need a van?" If the answer was "van", van it would be. He'd not mention that this would mean it would be hired out of his own pocket to help a friend, and no doubt he'd explain it away if he had to with a smile and an 'it was fun to drive one for a change'.
Several people remember him as the quiet voice of encouragement that reassured them that they could sing, and their music was worth listening to.
For a decade or more, he provided sound equipment every year for a convention in Germany, bringing it over voluntarily at his own expense... because he wanted to, because it made his friends sound better, and because working behind a mixing desk was his idea of fun. There's no doubt the convention could have paid him, but I doubt he'd have let them.
For a long time, my drinks cabinet contained a bottle of whisky that he'd given me on an impulse. For no reason other than we'd shared some of it at a convention, and he knew that I'd really liked it, even though he'd bought it for himself.
And that only scratches the surface - there are many more similar tales, I'm sure, from the different communities of which he was a part. Sure, he had strong opinions, and wasn't afraid to express them. He was completely unable to wrap up a phone call inside half an hour, because he had so much to share and talk about. He actually had a mild stammer, except when he sang. And, you know, none of those matter any more.
This was the man of 55 who passed away on the 10th. There's a big, Keris-shaped hole in the world since then, one that only he could have filled. Many people's lives are the poorer now he's gone.
I was proud to be able to call him a friend.
Just had an email back that said:
Thank you very much for this extremely well written tribute.
Do you please have a picture of Christopher that we could use to accompany the article?
I've sorted out the latter request (thanks to Kirstin T), but here's what I wrote:
"Man, 55..."
Mid-afternoon on Thursday 10th November, there was a fatal three-way car accident near Wing. I'm well aware that whatever the Herald staffer who reported it was restricted in what they could say by the nature of the accident, and I'd in no way want them or anyone else to take the following as a criticism of that necessarily bare report.
However, let me tell you and your readers a little about the person whose life was ended in that accident, and try and explain why it seems so.. unfair is the only word I can find... that for most of your readers, all they would ever know of him is "Man, 55". Another statistic, another sad sigh and a turn of the page.
His name was Christopher Croughton, but his friends, and he had many, knew him as "Keris", for reasons that I suspect many of us never learned. Had you met him, short, bearded, bespectacled, somewhat rotund and balding, you'd probably have guessed that he was a computer programmer. And you'd have been right.
In it's own way, though, that's no more of a summary than 'man, 55'. Keris was also, among other things, a talented singer, musician and sound engineer. He was responsible for the management of some bits of the Internet in the UK, as well as being a radio amateur, a lover of good whisky and an avid fan and reader of science fiction.
But sometimes, the measure of a man is in how he's remembered. When news of Keris' death came out amongst his friends, people from as far afield as San Francisco and Toronto, through the length and breadth of the UK, to places in Germany, each found they had a story to tell. And most of them focussed on one thing: his quiet, unstinting generosity.
He would ask friends if they needed a lift to some function, and in conversation later it would transpire that he'd quite deliberately stayed at a Travelodge to facilitate this. And would shrug it off with a smile, and the explanation that it meant he got to have porridge for breakfast, and he liked porridge.
Several people recall him offering to help them move stuff, and asking cheerfully, "will it fit in a car, or will you need a van?" If the answer was "van", van it would be. He'd not mention that this would mean it would be hired out of his own pocket to help a friend, and no doubt he'd explain it away if he had to with a smile and an 'it was fun to drive one for a change'.
Several people remember him as the quiet voice of encouragement that reassured them that they could sing, and their music was worth listening to.
For a decade or more, he provided sound equipment every year for a convention in Germany, bringing it over voluntarily at his own expense... because he wanted to, because it made his friends sound better, and because working behind a mixing desk was his idea of fun. There's no doubt the convention could have paid him, but I doubt he'd have let them.
For a long time, my drinks cabinet contained a bottle of whisky that he'd given me on an impulse. For no reason other than we'd shared some of it at a convention, and he knew that I'd really liked it, even though he'd bought it for himself.
And that only scratches the surface - there are many more similar tales, I'm sure, from the different communities of which he was a part. Sure, he had strong opinions, and wasn't afraid to express them. He was completely unable to wrap up a phone call inside half an hour, because he had so much to share and talk about. He actually had a mild stammer, except when he sang. And, you know, none of those matter any more.
This was the man of 55 who passed away on the 10th. There's a big, Keris-shaped hole in the world since then, one that only he could have filled. Many people's lives are the poorer now he's gone.
I was proud to be able to call him a friend.