I phoned home yesterday because my mother left a mysterious and unexplained message on my answering machine that was basically:

"I have news. Phone home."

So I did.

Turns out Imhotep died last week from a massive heart attack.

Imhotep, also known as Sasquatch (for obvious reasons if you knew him), and I believe his actual name was Richard, was fabulous.

He'd always turn up at the twins place when I was over with interesting things he'd made for them, like necklaces of allspice seeds, and strings of rosehips and pieces of broken mirrors and glass beads and incomplete tarot decks.

I hope I still have the tarot card he gave me. I think it was the Sun.

I wonder if Judy ever finished the Egyptian coller he wanted.

I hope so.

He was a really, really big guy. It feels weird saying 'he was', but it's true now.

I didn't think he'd ever go. I remember him when I was a really little kid, doing face-painting at the farmer's market on Saturday mornings. I was always kind of scared of him because he was huge and silent and had all sorts of weird piecings and tatoos and had these really serious eyes that almost seemed to look right through you.

I became friends with him only in the last few years, and I discovered a fabulous guy behind those serious eyes.

Man, one night me and him and the twins and Cat sat around seeing what size of stuffed toy we could fit through his stretched earlobes.

It was really bizarre, seeing this little blue smiling rabbit dangling from the ear of this serious, pierced, long haired man.

I'll miss him.

He was good to Brian when Brian was having his breakdown, right when Brian needed a steady rock.

And Imhotep was certainly a steady rock.

I'll miss seeing him ride around town on his old bike that was all woven through with ribbons and bells, and see him lumbering down the street, head and shoulders above everyone else, with his Chinese straw hat on his head, his backpack on his back and his walking stick in hand, like he was on some sort of pilgremidge.

I'll miss the few hugs I got from him, trying to wrap my arms around his expansive girth, and the earthy smell he always had.

Not stinky. Just earthy. Like spices and roots and leaves. Like the woods.

I'll miss his stone stacking on Mim's Beach, Painted Rock, and Redsands (the nude beaches), and the huge peace sign he put under the water in one of the coves that I took a bath in once.

And the labyrinth out at Mim's Beach that I once walked completely naked. He'd obviously walked it himself, because there was all sorts of sparkly pieces of glass and tin and shiny rocks in the center.

I'll miss that.

I'll miss him.

At peace, old friend. We'll see each other again sometime.

Before&After