All week I have gratefully absorbed the tear-filled, heartfelt memories here. It has been a salve for my soul, helping me to understand why I feel so bloody sad.

It was probably '82 or so when I first met Tom. Our paths crossed left and right over the years, he visited my radio show a time or two, I'd catch him at The Silver Spoon or Folklife and see him often at Bryan and Jeri's playing hoops with Bowers and the boys or...working out front on his car.

About 10 years later, I was licking my wounds from a failed relationship, virtually homeless and given shelter at "Bowers' Towers", that funky, welcoming 3-story Victorian fixer-upper. Dundee was crashing in some other room, and would show up alongside my pallet on the floor with a strong cuppa joe, ready to start the day with shared tales of the vagueries of love lost and won, gently encouraging me not to sink deeper into that dark place. That mellifluous and sandy voice of his could melt ice off a glacier and make grown women weak in the knees. You only had to hear him say [your name here] and it would never sound quite as sweet again, from anyone.

I came across a piece of fabric today, saved from one of my favorite old cowboy shirts. Worn and frayed, yet soft and durable, blue as Tom's eyes, impossible to say goodbye to.

What a truly beloved man, our Dundee, to be lifted far above the common measures of success and heralded as such an adored spirit.

Thank you all for the remembrances, keep 'em coming!

from the NW corner,
Susan Madden