I miss you every day D. As we are about to celebrate Thanksgiving, my heart is empty and hollow. I love and miss you. 

Derrick was an unforgettable friend. We met in college at an RA retreat before school started in 1995 and I remember that first conversation lasted into the wee hours under bright stars in the Rocky Mountains. After that, I always looked forward to any time we could spend together. He joined the Peace Corps a year after I did and then we both found ourselves in Brooklyn, where we met up on occasion…I did not know of his struggle in recent years, and have been long overdue in getting in touch with him (I left NYC five years ago). His sensitivity and commitment for good in this world had to have weighed on him. He understood innately what Thich Nhat Hanh meant when he said, “Compassion is a verb.”
I’m so very sorry for his family and close friends. He was a friend, an intense and passionate soul capable of fierce competition, social justice triumphs and whimsy. He always made me feel seen and heard, that I mattered. What a gift. I will miss him, and am so grateful to have known him. Much love.

My condolences to all of us mourning our loss of a friend and colleague.  D.C. and I both founded nonprofits at about the same time and shared many stories about the challenges of fiscal sponsorship and fundraising.  Despite those challenges, his passion and life's work has far reaching influences:  Recently my tweens told me about a middle school workshops they've participated in where they learned how to do better Google searches and be critical thinkers while on the internet.  I credit D.C. and LAMP for that influence; thank you.  DC's quote on NAMLE's website is worth repeating: "We do not need to teach our young people what to think, we need to teach them to question everything they think and encounter."  Thank you D.C. for all your fearless leadership; you will be deeply missed. 

My condolence to Emily and his family.  

I met DC at a holiday networking event, but our conversation seemed deeper than just exchanging numbers. I later found out more about The LAMP and the amazing mission DC was on to help city kids with media literacy. I was once a kid from Brooklyn who benefited from such programs. So, I really appreciated the work DC and Emily started.  

DC is a person who asks, "how can I help?" I was astonished by his generosity and sometimes heard the frustration in his voice that we aren't all the same way. 

Peace DC. 

Truly sad to see such a decent, funny, creative man has passed. Forming LAMP was visionary and its mission is still vital. I’m sorry, Emily.

What I actually wanted to say today but couldn’t get the words out . . .

Derrick, Derrick Charles, DC, D, Uncle Monkey and Uncle DC, many monikers and more he lived by and up to. My brother lived his life with passion and conviction.

Never would I have thought that I would be speaking at my little brother’s funeral. I always assumed since he was such a stinker and so ornery, he would outlive everyone. But, here I am now, fighting back the tears and doing it with a broken heart. My biggest task at hand, how do I fit 47 years of memories into a few minutes?

Our childhood was lots of time spent together, and mind you, though we loved each other very much, we had the typical brother/sister relationship, as well was so immersed in our creativity and sibling bonding. We used to build towns with our Lincoln logs, tinker toys and matchbox cars; lip synched to Hit Me with Your Best shot while mimicking Battle of the Network Stars; roller skated down in our unfinished basement to Xanadu; made numerous commercials, parodies and magic shows. Even though our bedrooms were right by each other growing up (which apparently wasn’t close enough for us) we had cool toy phones installed in our rooms and could “call” each other whenever we wanted. So many holidays were spent creating our best Christmas show that we made our poor relatives sit through, memories we created that I still hold dear to this day.

Growing up, Derrick was a hockey player and I a figure skater, therefore a lot of hours were spent not only on the ice together but at numerous competitions and tournaments, more memories made. Our childhood was one I have many fond memories of, and to be honest, that most of those memories include my brother and I together. Now mind you, he was the typical little brother, barging into my room unannounced, or putting fake lizards on door handles or always subjecting me to the “claw”. We even came up with our own language which of course in turn, taught my own two daughters. I can imagine that our parents were always proud of our closeness and bonding, even still to this day.

Through the years, no matter where we each lived, we were still very much a part of each other’s lives. He was living his life to the fullest in NYC and I was a wife and a mom on the West Coast. Whether that was a phone call or later on a text, we always found a way to connect. The day of 9/11, Gregg called me and told me to call my brother right away. For some unknown reason, I was able to reach him and immediately was relieved he was safe. Every year, on that anniversary, he and I would talk about that dark day.

My brother and I could not have been more different but that didn’t lessen our love for each other. He was eloquent, well-written and educated, stylish and knew how to live life. His work he did and lives he touched goes unsurmounted. About five days ago, my oldest daughter was in NOLA. She sent me a video of a street performer, singing “My Way” by Frank Sinatra. Well, that happens to be my username on a social media app. I sat there and sang along with the words and then it hit me. Those weren’t my words I had been singing but my brother’s. He in fact, did everything HIS way. That’s what made him so special and endearing.

I know that my heart will be broken for a very long time but I am reminded of another childhood song we loved “Reunited” and I cannot wait until that day when we meet again. I love you D.

Passage from FRANNY AND ZOOEY by J.D. Salinger, as ready by Corey Valdez on 11/6: 

“Do you want to hear what the special method of praying was that the starets told him about?” she [Franny] asked. “It’s really sort of interesting, in a way.”

Lane cut into his last pair of frogs’ legs. “Sure,” he said. “Sure.”

“Well, as I said, the pilgrim–this simple peasant–-started the whole pilgrimage to find out what it means in the Bible when it says you’re supposed to pray without ceasing. And then he meets this starets–this very advanced religious person I mentioned, the one who’d been studying the ‘Philokalia’ for years and years and years.” Franny stopped suddenly to reflect, to organize. “Well, the starets tells him about the Jesus Prayer first of all. ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.’ I mean that’s what it is. And he explains to him that those are the best words to use when you pray. Especially the word ‘mercy,’ because it’s such a really enormous word and can mean so many things. I mean it doesn’t just have to mean mercy.” Franny paused to reflect again. She was no longer looking at Lane’s plate but over his shoulder. “Anyway,” she went on, “the starets tells the pilgrim that if you keep saying the prayer over and over again–you only have to just do it with your lips at first–then eventually what happens, the prayer becomes self-active. Something happens after a while. I don’t know what, but something happens, and the words get synchronized with the person’s heartbeats, and then you’re actually praying without ceasing. Which has a really tremendous, mystical effect on your whole outlook. I mean that’s the whole point of it, more or less. I mean you do it to purify your whole outlook and get an absolutely new conception of what everything’s about.”

Lane had finished eating. Now, as Franny paused again, he sat back and lit a cigarette and watched her face. She was still looking abstractedly ahead of her, past his shoulder, and seemed scarcely aware of his presence.

Eulogy as delivered on 11/6:

The call I had with the hospital on the morning of October 22 was one I had been dreading for approximately five years. Even so, the first thought that ran through my head was that this must be one of DC’s elaborate pranks. Then when the doctor said they didn’t expect him to last the day, I thought, “Check your work, Doc, and buckle up, because he will survive you and me and everyone else. He will survive nuclear winter and make minions of the cockroaches.”

It will probably not surprise anyone that what we are doing here today is not the funeral D.C. had in mind for himself. I won’t go into all the particular details of what he really wanted, because they may be too morbid for some of the folks here, but let me just say that the ideal ceremony involved Ozzy Osbourne’s Mr. Crowley, a cannon, a pack of border collies and a sex worker in a tube top. Anyway. Sorry darling that we couldn’t give you what you wanted.

D.C. was a complicated person, which really is why I loved him. I have a thing about getting bored in relationships and after our first date in 2004 lasted twelve hours, I knew that boredom was not going to be an issue with this guy. I loved his persistence, his resilience, his “get up off the ice” attitude, his pursuit of beauty, his love of life. He was full of contradictions. In the course of one conversation, it was not uncommon to want to smack him one minute and then hug him so hard the next. To know him and to love him was to be mildly infuriated by him, at least some of the time.

When our partnership was good, it was very, very good. We were each other’s biggest critics, but also each other’s biggest champions and defenders. Over seventeen years together, we grew a nonprofit, traveled the world, adopted pets, bought two homes, welcomed nieces and nephews into the world, grieved losses of loved ones. We said “I love you” every day, and kissed each other every time one of us left or entered our home, because we knew comings and goings were precious. We kissed before every meal, because we thought that was better than saying grace.

Our final years together have been the most difficult time of my life. Like many others here, I had to draw boundaries, and that was incredibly painful. Ultimately, for the sake of my mental and physical health, and because I believed I was enabling his addiction rather than helping his recovery, I had to end the marriage. When he died, we had been separated for thirteen months and were in the process of getting a divorce. But you all know what it’s like trying to get DC to do something he doesn’t want to do, so not much progress was made on that front.

I never stopped loving the person DC was before addiction took over his mind and his body. I tried my best to support his recovery, but he was the only person who could save himself. He had a whole second act if he wanted it, and it is heartbreaking that he would not, could not, reach out and take it when so many people wanted to help. The same persistence that led him to co-found a non-profit from scratch was applied to his own self-destruction, and that is a tragedy. I know some people would say I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but the D.C. I knew would have wanted to be remembered as a full human being, flaws and all, and I love that.

I want to thank everyone for coming today, and for the many kind words of love and support that I have personally received and that have been posted to the memorial website. I want to thank my family, both biological and chosen, who have shown up in amazing ways not just when D.C. passed away, but over the course of the last five years. I also want to thank everyone who has been able to contribute to either the ASPCA or Rocky Mountain Puppy Rescue. DC would love that even in death, he is still fundraising.

Like all of you, I have countless stories and memories of D.C., far too many to share here, so I’ll just close with one. We were in Vermont one winter, planning for our wedding, a very small affair which took place at the home of my aunt, uncle and cousin. One day my aunt and I went out to do some errands, and DC went cross-country skiing with my uncle and cousin. When my aunt and I pulled up in the car to meet them, DC was skating on a frozen pond of ice, snow falling all around him in the Green Mountains (which of course he would say were hills compared to the Rockies). I have no idea how he wrangled a pair of skates, but in that moment, he had the joy of a child. If you’ve ever seen him skate, you know the look I mean. I like to imagine that wherever he is, he is skating his heart out on an infinite glass pond, his dogs running beside him, just waiting for us all to join him for a cup of hot cocoa to hear out his latest plans to save the world.

I have been trying to find the photo of the day I met DC.  I was sitting on a bus in NYC heading to Reading, PA to knock on doors for Hillary.  I was sitting alone in the front of the bus.  DC came on the bus with a friend but asked if he could sit next to me.  I immediately loved this guy.  We chatted the whole way to PA and when we got off the bus, we canvassed together.  DC was bright, smart, very politically savvy and very kind.  I was 70 at the time and he always treated me so respectfully.  I can't believe he wanted to stay in touch and introduce me to his beautiful and talented wife, Emily.  We spent the next couple of years getting together for meals in Manhattan and Brooklyn when our schedules aligned.  He was very excited about his venture.  22x20.  22 million new voters by 2020.  It didn't help Hillary in 2016 but I think it certainly helped our democracy in 2020.   We were in touch right until Covid and then the world changed.  We emailed but it wasn't the same.  I moved to VT and lately DC and Emily have been on my mind, I send him a message on Signal to see if he was still there and invited them to come to VT.  Who knew that two days later, I would get an email from Emily with the terrible news that DC had left the planet.  He was such a bright, burning flame and sometimes too good for this world.  I am still in shock and can't believe I will never see him again.   A little piece of my world will never be the same.  My deepest condolences to Emily.  If you need anything or want to get away, please contact me.  DC, you were one of a kind and the world will be slightly off kilter without you in it.  Love, Paulette

Derrick, You will forever be in my heart the high school boy I knew. Please rest peacefully, now. With love, Linda (York) Braly

To say that Derrick was a  very old friend of mine feels like an understatement--we first met in 4th grade! We shared many adventures, creative and otherwise. We started to fall in love with jazz around the same time so I was there to witness the full flowering of his John Coltrane obsession. And both of us were "Twin Peaks" fanatics; when Episode 8 of the new series debuted, we had several long conversations marveling over its awesome power. On the other hand, we always had fun needling each other about the other's favorite films--he hated Altman's "Short Cuts" just to be stubborn and sorry, Derrick, but despite all your arguments I still can't get behind Malick's "The New World." 

I've been struggling to find words that capture what a lovely human being he was. He was filled to overflowing with humor and energy and enthusiasm. I will miss him deeply. 

In addition to everything else, he helped me make my first feature film. He was invaluable behind the scenes (and hammed it up shamelessly onscreen). Some of you have asked where you can see some footage of him; "Pause of the Clock" is available via Vimeo at https://vimeo.com/ondemand/pauseoftheclock. I hope it rekindles some fond memories.

My deepest sympathies. Prayers for all those he touched

I wanted to share a link to an email about D.C. that went out to the National Association for Media Literacy Education earlier this week as a tribute to him.      https://news.namle.net/webmail/888703/168372825/be44e8d64e6b43418244b492bca7dbf389fc7b22c742fb3986c90031bd409a1c

Does anyone know if DC had any favorite restaurants/places to visit in Denver that I could visit in his honor? I'm heading to Denver today for a few days.

To those who know me: My son was the child of my soul. I have lost my son this week. Consequently, I am unable to think, to feel, to breathe, to be, to understand what it is to be a Mother. I am lost like a child wandering in the desert. I have lost my way in this life and do not know  when or if I will ever find my way back. I pray, if you have walked this path before me, you never have to walk it again. If you have not, please be patient and gentle with me as I stumble through the darkness searching for the laughter of my child now lost from the grasp of my arms . .

Diner lunches, never splitting the check, just taking turns from one time to the next. His beloved dogs. The arm band to protect the colors on his tattoo. Endless passion for The LAMP.  Holiday cooking. Passionate opinions. Relentlessness. Thoughtfulness. Strong perspectives on NYC real estate. Strong support for Bill de Blasio. A willingness to talk to anyone, leaving no stone unturned as he sought support for the work he lived and breathed. 

These are some of the words and memories that have been floating around my mind over the past week since I heard the horrible news of DC's passing. I cannot believe he's gone.  DC and I met through Coro's Leadership NY program; we were not only part of the same larger 50 person cohort, but also part of a 6 person small group that spent countless hours coordinating a project focused on criminal justice in NYC. I learned so much from him-- from listening, observing, asking questions, during Coro, but especially in the years of friendship that followed.   

I feel so fortunate that we stayed in touch after Coro. I followed the highs and lows of his journey with The Lamp, and the time since. DC exemplified passion and heart. He believed in the work of The Lamp with every fiber of his being, and pursued every opportunity to help the organization build and grow. 

I cannot believe he's gone. I'm fortunate to have called him a friend; he was one of a kind. 

I am stunned and just so heartbroken to hear of Derrick’s passing. He was a great friend to me in high school and college, and we managed to stay in touch over the years. He was one of a kind, and the world has lost a beautiful light. Rest well, Derrick. ❤️❤️

Here is a link if you’d like to share picture or video memories for the memorial montage.  

https://drive.google.com/driv…

Myairo