Another one?
Mar. 24th, 2026 11:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shivverI found out yesterday that my friend Rich just discovered that he has stage 4 pancreatic cancer -- incurable but therapy can prolong life and improve quality for a bit. I play in a concert band with his wife (he occasionally played in it, too) and she had informed the band, which is how I found out, but I've known him (well, worked with him) since the 1990s.
I actually got to work closely with him on a project back in 2012 or so and got to know him pretty well. At one point, we had to go up to Seattle to work in-house with the dev team, so we spent two weeks hanging out. I think the big things about Rich is that he's nice, optimistic, and fun. Maybe that doesn't sound like much, but he is always compared to his brother, who is a mean, conniving sociopath. Everyone loves Rich. No one likes his brother.
Honestly, Rich is awesome. One of the most respected game designers in this game-dev town. My favorite memory is going to this excellent sushi restaurant in Bellevue and sampling everything on the conveyor belt with him. (Ah, the things you do when the company is paying for your meals!) His wife says he still mentions that restaurant. But he's always happy to see you and eager to have fun. Oh, also, he and his kids are Doctor Who fans, so that one time we played Doctor Who: Through Time and Space and I snuck in my Thirteen cosplay under my uniform because the conductor said I couldn't but the president said I absolutely should, Rich wore my Dalek lights headband and his son wore one of my other accoutrements (don't remember what it was).
But the thing that's really getting me down today is that yet another of my friends is being taken by cancer when they're so young. Rich is a couple of years younger than me, and fours years ago, I posted about another friend who didn't even reach fifty.
I'm the last person in my generation on both sides of my family, with uncles and aunts that were 40-50 years older than me and cousins that are thirty years older than me, so for the past twenty years or so, any news from home meant someone had died. I'm used to that. But I'm not old enough yet that any news from my friends should mean the same thing. It's not fair, why Rich, why anyone at all, yadda yadda...
Fuck cancer.
I actually got to work closely with him on a project back in 2012 or so and got to know him pretty well. At one point, we had to go up to Seattle to work in-house with the dev team, so we spent two weeks hanging out. I think the big things about Rich is that he's nice, optimistic, and fun. Maybe that doesn't sound like much, but he is always compared to his brother, who is a mean, conniving sociopath. Everyone loves Rich. No one likes his brother.
Honestly, Rich is awesome. One of the most respected game designers in this game-dev town. My favorite memory is going to this excellent sushi restaurant in Bellevue and sampling everything on the conveyor belt with him. (Ah, the things you do when the company is paying for your meals!) His wife says he still mentions that restaurant. But he's always happy to see you and eager to have fun. Oh, also, he and his kids are Doctor Who fans, so that one time we played Doctor Who: Through Time and Space and I snuck in my Thirteen cosplay under my uniform because the conductor said I couldn't but the president said I absolutely should, Rich wore my Dalek lights headband and his son wore one of my other accoutrements (don't remember what it was).
But the thing that's really getting me down today is that yet another of my friends is being taken by cancer when they're so young. Rich is a couple of years younger than me, and fours years ago, I posted about another friend who didn't even reach fifty.
I'm the last person in my generation on both sides of my family, with uncles and aunts that were 40-50 years older than me and cousins that are thirty years older than me, so for the past twenty years or so, any news from home meant someone had died. I'm used to that. But I'm not old enough yet that any news from my friends should mean the same thing. It's not fair, why Rich, why anyone at all, yadda yadda...
Fuck cancer.
