to mike

While I was in Costa Rica, my colleague Mike passed away. He found out he had lymphoma just about a year ago. To be honest, I didn't know Mike outside of the office very well. We were both on the communications team at the Alliance for Excellent Education - the organization I loved and just recently left to pursue graduate school. Being on the same team meant that we interacted much more than I did with many of the other staff members my first year at the Alliance. He handled webinars and the website, video editing, and adeptly wrote code.

Mike was meticulous - organized in a way that always impressed me and made me take note (and brought to light how unorganized I was, in comparison). He kept an oversize desk calendar with a handwritten schedule of all of our webinars and events and other key dates. He used pencil for all tentative dates and inked them in once confirmed. I always smiled when he lugged his huge calendar into our weekly communications staff meeting. I, too, like everything right in front of me - visible with ink on paper. Within a few months, I had my very own oversize desk calendar keeping me company in my office space, too.

At some point in the year we worked together, I googled Mike, because I had a hunch that this man who was fairly private but whose love of baseball was as public as it gets, had stories. Had interesting experiences. Of course, I could've just asked him about it all, but I was the new kid in the office, and the Internet just makes everything so easy. He came up as one of the first search results for his name, and I learned right away that he has an Emmy - two, in fact. I emailed him asking a work question as a ruse and slipping in there that one day I've love to hear his story of winning an Emmy. He got right back to me with a friendly response, answering the work question in detail, but he didn't mention the Emmy. I don't know why - humility? But I never brought it up again.

I'm not sure what Mike's beliefs were, but I don't need to know. Whatever he believed, I hope with all my heart that he was at peace and unafraid. That the time he had with his family gave them a chance to say the things they wanted to say, the things he wanted them to carry in their hearts, and the things they needed him to know. That he felt loved and comforted and pain free. And I hope now that all the love in the world is showered on his family, giving them hope and a sense that it's going to be okay.

RIP, Mike. Everyone who knew you misses you.