oh... oh... no.

Dear Neil,

I am having a hard time really grasping the news that you are gone.
Just a few short years ago you came into my life via darling Cathy (somehow it seems more appropriate to use her given name just now, as well as her darling Gypsy moniker).

And I am having a hard time writing about you being gone. So, instead, I will write directly to you, with love.

Neil, you were so many things to so many of us.
So deeply intelligent, that much is obvious. But also so very witty, a bit of a wonderful wise-ass really, and creative. You made my crack up time and time again, and thank God Facebook was there after your blog went off-line. I am hoping it might still be resurrected somehow, a lasting tribute to be visited by us all, to laugh at, cry, be inspired to think by.
Your tenderness shone through on so many levels, a post here, a comment there. I have spent the time since I met Cathy and the others believing fully that one day, not so long away, I would travel to meet you all in person, and when the beau dear Gypsy loves so well sauntered into my life, I assumed you would just be there when I showed up at the flat above the Chinese take-away one day.
You will be, via her heart.
But I will miss your laughter that I have heard so many times in your words and in my head not being a part of that which I certainly will still share with Cathy and Chantal and the babes. But then again, perhaps I will not miss it at all. Perhaps, if we listen softly enough, we will hear it yet, echoed in years of love and oneness.

A part of me thinks that you just could not wait for the adventure that awaits us all at the point when life turns to something else. That you just HAD to go and see what awaits, to make sure it is all up to snuff.

I have not watched Val's video just yet... but I think it a good lead to follow, since you offered so many of your own to us. It will follow... when the inspiration is right. I know you can appreciate that.

Reading this over, my words seem too hollow, not enough.
But perhaps that is because I feel a little hollow right now.
What I wish more than anything is that I could fly to Trashington, to be there for our girl. And she is ours, isn't she? Funny. From blog to blog, never meeting in person, I could not mourn you more or feel more sorrow for Gypsy if we had met in person. You are, and will always be, as real and precious to me as the people I see and touch every day. What a brilliant gift you are to me. To us all.

Keep the kettle warming. We will all be there soon enough. Try not to get into too much mischief up there. I don't believe in hell, and even if I did, it would still be heaven for you me mate.

Talk soon.
Much love,
Stephanie