Muriel, Amanda and all of you in the Whidbey community.   We are here as the community of Mark, with you in grief.   I hope you feel the love and care that is pouring forward.  I know how much Mark loves you and is still carrying you.   

I am not sure what to say right now.   Mainly, I feel bereft and in gratitude for these 22 years of crazy, loving friendship.  I know I am not alone in these feelings.  Mark did friendship so well, and with so many people.  It was beyond amazing.  

But for my personal homage and witness, I am sharing a post from my own facebook page here, with a little embelishment, and a poem. 

I hope you stay close.  

"Many of you who know me well, know that I have had a wonderful friend for many years now (22 years). This friend mentored me, and taught with me in grad school, sent me two trillion emails about two trillion things with a thirst for mental jousting, and the curiosity of a giant puppy. We argued for years, laughed for years, gave each other the best of love, care and friendly trouble we could. This is my friend Mark Brady.....

I have so very much to say about this large hearted man who started his life in the projects of New Haven CT, who was on his own at a very young age when his single mother was taken away for alcoholism and mental illness. Who after his first profession at 17 (being a theif), somehow managed to become a house builder, to drive a pickup west, drawn to be present for "San Francisco 1972", and later became a phd transpersonal psychologist, a  husband and father, a neurscience educator, an award winning novelist, and a teacher of many, many, many things: parenting, altruism, listening skills, AI.   As far as I know, Mark never charged people for conversations and the sharing of what he knew. He trusted that his benevolence and generosity would evoke return.

So we have lost a truly amazing human, a bodhisatva to the core. I wonder if I could ask all of you to offer him our silent blessing and thanks, even if you do not know him, because his work has touched all of mine and many others. He certainly deserves the very best send-off we can communally give him.

Mark, I am including a poem I wrote about you so long ago now.  I have even more to say now.  But  may you recognize how deeply you are loved, and by how many as you go through your process of becoming all of us.

Thank you.

Poem for Mark

This one was like a moonfilled loom

Where delicate gifts are woven in and out of threads

Borne of the heart’s madness

A master weaver

Working only with

Silk, water and ash

A cool lake

Where we went to drink, bathe

And see our own faces

Still, this one had drawn his own blood

And drunk it, so that he knew the rules

Of salt and history

He had played his own harp

and he listened a long time

into the conch shell

For that particular note

that some part of me was humming

but could not hear

And so

it is right

for me to

Thank you.

- 2005

Dear Muriel, Amanda and family,

I do not have words to convey how my heart wishes to comfort you. 

I know there are no words, and comfort come so slowly. 

Mark was loved by many, and yet, it is you today who experience  

his loss most dearly. You are in my thoughts and will be in the days

 and months ahead.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out if there is anything I can

 offer you--a memory, a conversation, or simply, what Mark taught me is 

often best, a listening ear and heart.

With love,

Susan O'