The Empty Chair

From the Knights of the Dinner Table, reproduced here without permission but I do hope they would understand, as a memory of Joe:

The Empty Chair

Eulogy for a Gamer

There is an empty chair,
at the table this day.
A hallowed place where,
a friend once played.

The roll of his dice,
my ears long to hear.
Or perhaps it would suffice,
if he should suddenly appear.

With character sheet in hand,
and a bag of Cheeze-doodles to share.
All his friends would stand,
as he sat in the empty chair.

I hear his voice a-callin’,
and it ties my heart in a knot.
For he cries, “Though a comrade has fallen,
You must play for those who cannot.”

We conquered worlds on the run,
he and I in the name of fun.
And as others may come and go,
I make both both friend and foe.

But what I long for most,
is our past now long a ghost.

Joe was out for dinner with some other friends on Saturday, but didn't feel to well. He went home feeling lousy.

Sunday morning, he must have felt a lot worse because he went to the Kemptville Hospital. They wasted no time in rushing him to the Queensway Carleton. His lungs were filling up with fluid and his vitals were weakening fast.

They asked him Sunday night if he wanted to call anyone, presumably given his dire state. Being Joe, he didn't want to inconvenience anyone.

Monday, in the wee hours, he left us.

Whatever it was hit that fast, wasn't stoppable by the doctors and medical staff at the hospital, and claimed his life much too erly.

Tonight, we sat around a table and toasted Joe with a good bottle of port. We talked about what playing with him was like and what we'd miss (and a couple of minor things we wouldn't). We had a Senators cap signed by Daniel Alfredson standing in for Joe (he was a season ticket holder at the Scotia Bank Place).

Then we played the Dungeons and Dragons game he had played with us so far. We moved through the penultimate adventure and kept his character involved. The Gamemaster has a plan for the character, should he survive until the end - a good ending to his story, something Joe never got a chance to write.

It wasn't the same. Joe brought something to our game that is now missing. But it isn't just missing in the game, it is missing in all of us to one extent or another.

Peace, Brother Joseph. And Peace to your family.

A Toast To Your Memory, Joseph

Today brought some harsh news. My friend Joe MacLellan, whom I gamed with weekly for enough years I don't really remember when it started, passed away early Monday morning from complications from an undiagnosed diabetes.

It was a sudden and shocking notification today from one of Joe's other friends that he had passed. I'm not sure when his last post to our game forum was, but it couldn't have been more than 2-3 weeks ago, maybe less than that.

Joe had his off days, but so do I. None of us, including I think Joe, wrote it up to anything more serious. I think Joe had even planned to play in our soon to start Formula De board-game racing championship and was involved in a Dungeons and Dragons campaign and a Champions campaign with our group. I think he couldn't have really seen it coming either.

Our esteemed Methuselah remarked on was how Joe was one of the youngest (possibly the youngest) among us. That set everyone even more aback.

I think we are all contemplating how this demonstrates how ephemeral life is, how fleeting, and how often we take for granted the people in our lives without meaning to do so. I think people are also considering how much of a miss he'll be in our group - he had a kind of quiet, unexpected sense of humour that would find you smiling when you didn't really expect it. I'll miss that about Joe the most.

I'm sorry for his Dad; Joe's mom passed about six months ago. That's a hard year for anybody. No parent should have to outlive their child.

Joe is being cremated and the remains taken back to Cape Breton for the funeral. I think it likely there will be some form of observance here in Ottawa, even if it is only his friends of various groups getting together to toast his memory and bid him peace in his eternal rest.

I think my take-away from this is a reinforcement of the lesson my parents' struggles and health concerns and scares have driven home: You just don't know when our number is up, when the good times will be replaced by rough times, and when the people you love may be suffering or taken from you.

I think the thing to do about that is to live each day a little more vividly for those who have been taken from your life and to be sure to let those in their lives know how much they mean to you.

With that in mind, I'm going to list the names of some of the people that make my infinitely better than it would have been otherwise: Mom, Dad, Cousin Alan, Linda, Jim, Jean-Pierre, Tom, Dean, Ian, Paul, Adrian, Doug, Gary, Rob, Ken, Peter, Edward, Jeff, James, Derek, Paul II, Chris, Rick, Dan, Shane, Lorry, Alex, Mel, Louise, Cathy, Myriam, Erica, Toni, Alan, Mark, Dave, Jason, Adam, Chris of Virginia Beach, Allan of Lousianna, Jonathan of Albany, Robert of Rhinebeck, Carlos of Bethany, Kurt of Stony Brook, Phil, Louise, Angelica, Susie, Shelley, Rhonda, Jim, David, Tracy and Maya, Honour and Marion, Paul and Susan, four heartbreakers, and (especially) Alexander and Jack. I've only gotten started... and if I kept on, I'm sure I could fill a page and not be exhausted.

If you are on that list or should have been and are not, then I hold for you a special affection, a warmth of sentiment and a surfeit of respect. I just wanted to say because I have the chance.

And my respects to you, Joseph. May you rest in peace and may your family find a peace in the knowledge you lived a life that touched those around you.

Tom.