Star Stuff

May 4, 2024

Thank you for being here. 

Thank you for the incredible care, love, and generosity you have graced us with in the wake of Will’s death. You have held us, supported us, fed us — reminded us we are not alone. 

I am writing this on Friday, May 3, at about 9 pm. Will would probably laugh at my procrastination — he was one who could finish things well ahead of a deadline, focusing on a task without the drama of reluctance and indecision. Of course, I think he would understand why this was a hard task to face. 

We got to know each other in college when we worked together at Ritter Planetarium. But we actually interacted before that, during our very first semester when we were in the same chemistry lab. 

I was not the most serious student that year. Scattered and a bit wild with my recent launch into “adulthood,” classes were not exactly my top priority. Several weeks into that first semester I was officially bombing chem lab, and when I actually started trying to do the labs correctly, that didn’t go very well, either. 

At the next table over there was this calm, quiet guy, and I could tell he knew what he was doing. He was focused, always working through the experiments carefully and sensibly — measuring and calculating and completing the assignments in the exact manner intended. (How very strange and mysterious!) 

Drawn to the obviously superior knowledge and know-how, one class I said hi and asked him a question about a lab I was struggling with. And he answered — in a steady, gentle fashion, showing me his setup for the experiment. It helped. 

Through the rest of the semester, he never refused to help me when I asked — even though I’m sure I was pretty annoying at times. I didn’t think too much of it at the time — it was at least another year before I started taking college more seriously — but as you can tell, it stuck with me. 

The next year I started working at the planetarium and we got to know each other as co-workers and eventually friends. It was another couple of years before we dated — we both had other things going on through most of college — but we bonded over the planetarium work — making slides, lining up projectors with each season’s constellations, building displays, doing shows for school groups and the public. It was really a lot of fun — and from the very beginning I could tell how much he truly enjoyed teaching people about astronomy. There was no judgment for what people didn’t know — just an eagerness to help them learn. 

We both loved maps and random road trips — exploring just because. It was his idea to drive up to Meredith, Michigan, so I could take a photo with the sign. 

He was thoughtful about the world in a way I wasn’t quite yet, and this would become an important aspect of our lives together. 

We moved to Massachusetts together for grad school and the next years were filled with New England adventures. What a glorious place to explore. The beautiful Pioneer Valley, where we lived…the trails and small, tucked-away towns of the Berkshires…Boston and the Cape… 

Driving up Mt. Washington, exploring the White and Green Mountains…Maine and Rhode Island just because. (Connecticut mostly for the airport…sorry, Connecticut). 

The autumns. The winters. All of the seasons — so well-defined and pretty much perfect. Mt. Sugarloaf, the Bookmill, the Moan & Dove, eerie Quabbin with its abandoned, drowned towns. The old stone walls, the covered bridges. 

We loved the history, the hippie vibe…the way everyone was calm, all-business when a nor’easter was on the way — visiting the store without panic, buying only what was really needed for a short hunkering-down. We were blown away by our very first storm, which dropped over 20 inches of snow quickly and easily. We took silly photos of us trying to dig out our cars. 

Will used to talk about retiring to a cabin in the middle of the woods in Montague, where we lived for a time. I was more of the mindset that a vacation cabin in the middle of the woods would be nice, but still, I could see the appeal. And I could see him there easily — probably his beard very grown out…cooking, reading, enjoying a glass of grand marnier every evening after dinner. Porch beers and keeping up with local politics. 

Our relationship was far from perfect, especially during our initial years of marriage. For a time it was a rather winding, uncertain road — with potholes, and wrong turns…bridges out, and giant rotaries with 10 exits and bad signage — like that one when you’re going out to Cape Cod.

But — we never gave up on each other. 

We grew — we grew up. We learned to navigate. (We learned there’s no harm in doing a second lap around the rotary if you miss your exit.) 

Will excelled at a lot of things, but I think his best endeavor by far was being a dad. He approached the challenge of parenthood openly, and with patience and grace. He was always so excited to watch Anna grow and learn and start to figure out the world around her. He loved taking her to museums — and once we moved to Maryland, that was a regular thing, with DC being so close. 

We were a close little family unit — a team of 3, really — and we created a home of science and math, music, curiosity and deep-thinking. We were nerdy and weird, at times painfully introverted and awkward, but we had so much fun together. And we were hilarious, all 3 of us, with a shared dry, sharp wit, and we laughed so much. We loved to travel together and had lots of plans for future trips. We loved our lives in Maryland. 

As Anna grew, we made sure she was tuned in to causes of social justice, to environmental and climate issues, to some of the broader challenges of society. Although it’s hard sometimes, we sought to never shield her too much from the realities of life. We were open with her when Will had his first mental health crisis in January of this year. 

Things had been building since before the holidays, and it became something more serious just after the new year. The anxiety was heavy and crippling. He was panicked about the upcoming election. He was struggling with imposter syndrome in his professional life. The illness that struck him produced a chaotic, distorted reality that must have been so painful. 

Inside the human mind, a whole universe — mysteries and unknowns we may never fully unravel.  

During his first crisis, in the middle of the night, we called 988. I didn’t know what else to do, but I cannot say enough about the existence of that service, how important it is. Someone is there immediately to help you, to listen to you, to talk to you. Never hesitate to call the line if you are in crisis. 

When the sun came up that day, in the relative clarity of daybreak, we went to the ER. Again, I didn’t know what else to do, but I think it was the right next step. The ER doctor was fabulous. He conversed with Will in an intellectual way, and got him started on a path of diagnosis and treatment.

It’s not easy to get the right kind of help in this situation — there is a lot to navigate, a lot to figure out. After the ER, we had a series of appointments. He saw a few different doctors, therapists. He started medication; it got changed up a few times. You have to be vigilant, you have to advocate for yourself, you have to do things it’s almost impossible to do when you’re struggling with your mental health, and I cannot imagine how one would manage that path on their own. 

Will eventually found a therapist he liked in Annapolis, and it felt like things were on the right path. Strangely, perhaps, it felt like we were closer than ever. I’d had some mental health struggles in my 20s, and it was like he finally understood a lot more about that time. We talked a lot. He was eager to get help, to move forward. There were still ups and downs, but it felt like we were going to be okay. 

We had an amazing time in Ohio for the solar eclipse. It was so great. 

Saturday, April 13, Anna had a day trip with the band, so it was just us that day. We went shopping, we went out to lunch. We lounged around and talked about the things we’d do when Anna went to college — how we’d go see her at band performances, how we’d train for a marathon together (it would be his first — I would be the expert for once!). We went out to dinner (a luxurious day!), then went for a walk at Allen Pond Park. 

Sunday I was packing and getting ready for my work trip, but it was an otherwise normal day. Monday the three of us texted as I traveled (I was 6 hours behind once I made it to my destination), shared photos and funny tidbits. He made shrimp scampi for them for dinner — and of course we had always joked that when I went out of town, it would be seafood time at the house; they are fans, I am not. He was looking forward to the week with Anna.

And this, most of all, is how I know it was an illness that took him. It wasn’t weakness, it wasn’t selfishness, it wasn’t any of the things people often say regarding suicide. Something snapped; something broke. 

I wish he had called me — even though it was the 3 am hour where I was, when he left the house for the last time. And of course I’ll always wonder if things would have gone differently, had I been here. I don’t know — I’ll never know. 

People always say, don’t wait. Do it now, say it now — because you never know what tomorrow may bring. It’s hard to live life like that, though. Our doubts, our fears, our own complex emotional lives often get in the way, and we hesitate. 

But — look at our shared humanity; it’s here, all around us. After Will’s death, I heard from people from every walk of life, every political inclination.

Strangers in airports comforted me, helped me, even though they didn’t know me. When I melted down after being denied boarding on my San Francisco to Baltimore flight, the last leg of my journey home from Hawaii, people came forward, offered to give up their seats.

(Side note: I ended up getting on that flight without having to accept this gift — they’d printed the wrong boarding pass for me when I started the journey back from Hawaii, that’s why I couldn’t board.)

I heard from people I grew up with whom I had long felt I no longer shared anything in common. But we have so much in common.

I want to try to remember that — to hold on to the knowledge and depth of our shared human experience…those moments that only seem to illuminate after tragedy, when we are just human beings, trying our best, sharing in the universal truths of living and dying.

Starstuff. 

I know Will will always be with us. And someday, the atoms of all of our bodies will once again join with the Earth, the universe, the endless cosmic cycling. And we’ll be a trio again…just…a little less orderly.