I Salute The Late Jake Midnight

Jake Midnight died about a year ago. I've written about him before here and here. I met him in the mid-90s, I think in the neighborhood coffee shop. We used to talk about getting out of debt and off the grid. He was more successful than I was with that kind of thing overall, and the chapper is, by the time I finally managed to get a yard and means to some self-sufficiency, he'd kicked the bucket. I was standing in my new backyard telling Vasco, a mutual friend, "I need to get Jake to come look at these trees," and Vasco said "Jake's dead."  In fact, Vasco had been to Jake's memorial service only the week before. I was a little irritated with him for not letting me know Jake was sick in the first place, or letting me know about the memorial service. But that's how it goes I guess; perhaps it was all for the best.

Aside from being entertaining and knowledgeable, Jake truly got excited about helping other people. This past year I've had about 50,000 instances to think "Jake would really be good to talk to about this," or "Jake would help me out with that." And "I wish I'd paid more attention to that song of his he performed that time, those lyrics were really cool, now I'll never hear it again." I'm not saying it wasn't his time to go, or I wish it hadn't happened. I'm just saying I miss him. He was a true character. The afterlife is a better place with him in it.