You were full of love, laughter, stories, kindness and willingness to help others.
Missed & loved Mucho!!

I’ll miss all the times you would bust out laughing and being the life of the party always.
I will always miss your back breaking huge pops. -Tbone

I am still angry about it. I am angry at Andy and at myself for not asking questions. Andy was a math prodigy. Yes, his father was a beloved math teacher, so maybe for Andy math was naturally a part of him. Can you be a prodigy and still make a miscalculation?

Andy came to work in our group in June 2011 right after graduating from Purdue. His technical skills were tops among his peers. His project management skills were fantastic, if largely just because Andy could do anything and so he just did it all. As years passed, and he was the senior analyst and a consultant, the newer analysts would enjoy learning from him – and the facile way he conveyed concepts to them. He always delivered early and consistently, there was no procrastination in Andy. Was there?

So, it was with some chagrin I imagine, that Andy texted me on July 30, 2021, to say he had COVID. “I’ll let you know … or if they need to hospitalize me. The latter is unlikely because my oxygen numbers are still good.” On August 2, we talked and by way of explanation, he said “I don’t really like needles … I procrastinated on getting the shot”.

I was surprised. We consulted to large companies on their health benefit plans. We both were fully aware of the risks and recommendations. Weren’t we?
—————–
email, Aug. 2, 2021

Dear Colleagues,

Andy H. asked me this morning to share the following statement with you:
“I am recovering from COVID and related secondary maladies at Deaconess Hospital. My prognosis is good but the recovery time is long… (there is) no official timeline… best guess is discharge Friday night or Saturday morning.”
——————
But you are a strong young man of 33. You have no comorbidities. You will recover and you will learn a valuable lesson about life, I was sure. And we would laugh together about how it’s a little embarrassing that you procrastinated on the shot. Won’t we?
—————–
email, Aug. 27, 2021

Dear Colleagues,

It is with great sadness and regret that I share that Andy passed away yesterday. I know this will come as a shock as it has been shocking to me.

Andy brought so much to our team. His brilliance, his wry wittiness but mostly his underlying sense of care for us and the great work that we do. I have been in contact with HR and his family. We will schedule some time soon for our practice to share our feelings, but for now just want to acknowledge the profound loss we and the world have just experienced. Please keep his family and each other in your thoughts and prayers.

Kind regards
——————
December 4, 2022. Hey Andy, I miss you. I am still mad at you and at myself. It gnaws at me. I shouldn’t feel survivor’s guilt. Should I?

“Father and Son” by Cat Stevens. A song I’ve always loved, as well as my late great father. Sitting on the boat as we sailed around the world, I contracted dengue. Sicker than heck, dad gave me some of his precious ice cream (boat in the middle of nowhere) and we were listening to music. Out comes “Father and Son.” On that day, nearly 20 years ago, he told me about how he’d found out his father passed at work and that the CD happened to be playing that song when he got into the car to get home. He played it on repeat for the whole 40 minutes home. I knew at that point, that would be his song too.

I never in my life thought I’d have to play it so soon, watching him depart on his eternal sail via a video call from my sister in the ICU room halfway around the world (Dad in North Carolina, my wife and I in Phuket, Thailand). Within a few seconds of his passing, beyond the normal emotional explosion of ?!?!, I turned the boat radio on as loud as possible (working on a boat at that time in a marina) and played “Father and Son.” I got to do that for him. I needed to do that for me even more I think.

I didn’t care about the boats and people next to me and the disturbances I made–Smashing a wooden paddle against the boat. The anger. The feeling of inexplicable pain. Luckily everyone left me alone, my wife came running from the house down the road to be there, just missing my dad’s passing, unfortunately. She was like a daughter to him, and vice-versa.

As dad’s ashes sit in a plastic urn (he didn’t want anything fancy, cheap Charlie) covered in photos, in North Carolina, at my sister’s house, I am getting ready to sail with my wife from Spain to the Caribbean to release my father to the sea to be with my mom, and finally have closure since the 26th of January 2021.

The boat is only possible due to my dad and being fortunate. Best part is, the boat is named ‘Dawdle’ — a word Dad would always use. It’s like he is here.

Best part is, just before purchasing it, we saw the signs from Dad … yellow heart in the sunrise that morning and a yellow butterfly flying around me, my wife, and our new home (the boat).

To honor the fallen and the grieving, I have placed 4 yellow hearts on the bottom of the boat, and other yellow hearts around the boat. There will be flags flying them and on the sails in the near future.

We are yellow hearts. They are more than a number. And we are not alone!

I miss you dad.

Father and Son. Thank you for that song, Cat Stevens.

One of Winston Churchill’s famous quotes was “If you are going through hell, keep going.” My husband Mike was a follower of Winston Churchill, the statesman who led his country through the most difficult times during WWII. Mike read everything about him and when we made our first trip to London we had to buy a cheap ceramic coffee mug of Winston Churchill to bring home.

I picked this quote because 20 years ago Mike was diagnosed with leukemia. He went through hell. But keep going. He was in Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital for 8 weeks but he survived. And only to have Covid take him from us. And now, to have people say, “Didn’t he have an underlying issue?”