Dan - A page for my oldest friend
Dan's parents and mine were friends. Dan was a year younger than me. We have known one another and been friends all of our lives, for 75+ years. We grew up in small town Midwest, biking, swimming in the city pool, then in the nearby limestone quarries. We discovered girls, drag raced (me more than him in that area, but he enjoyed it), loved the same music, dancing (Dan could dance while I was a klutz), went to concerts, smoked pot, and then I moved to Oregon. Dan and I corresponded via snail mail.
One winter he came to visit and it was the typical cool, drizzle. Like me, he loved it. He visited again in late spring and we went to the mountains and the coast. I was living the hippie lifestyle in NW Portland in a big shared home. He loved it. He went back to Indiana and decided to move to Oregon. Before that we did meet in Wyoming for our first real backpacking trip in the Wind River Range. It went well but only because the weather was merciful. I hitchhiked, with my dog, to Indiana and we drove to Oregon with Dan and got deeply into hiking, backpacking, XC skiing (again, Dan was excellent and I was the worst), and then snowshoeing after Dan crashed and was injured when he ran his ski tip through his cheek.
We returned to the Winds, explored a lot of the Cascades, in Oregon and Washington, and the North Cascades, then the Sawtooths, the Canadian Rockies, and the canyons in Utah and New Mexico. We always got along well, stayed reasonably safe, and did so for 50 years, more than 50, actually. Our last backpacking trip ended on June, 13, 2024. A week from that day Dan died suddenly and peacefully sitting on his sofa at home. There's an empty spot in me and I plan to save that spot until my last trail. Dan, I love you and I miss you.
One winter he came to visit and it was the typical cool, drizzle. Like me, he loved it. He visited again in late spring and we went to the mountains and the coast. I was living the hippie lifestyle in NW Portland in a big shared home. He loved it. He went back to Indiana and decided to move to Oregon. Before that we did meet in Wyoming for our first real backpacking trip in the Wind River Range. It went well but only because the weather was merciful. I hitchhiked, with my dog, to Indiana and we drove to Oregon with Dan and got deeply into hiking, backpacking, XC skiing (again, Dan was excellent and I was the worst), and then snowshoeing after Dan crashed and was injured when he ran his ski tip through his cheek.
We returned to the Winds, explored a lot of the Cascades, in Oregon and Washington, and the North Cascades, then the Sawtooths, the Canadian Rockies, and the canyons in Utah and New Mexico. We always got along well, stayed reasonably safe, and did so for 50 years, more than 50, actually. Our last backpacking trip ended on June, 13, 2024. A week from that day Dan died suddenly and peacefully sitting on his sofa at home. There's an empty spot in me and I plan to save that spot until my last trail. Dan, I love you and I miss you.