IWhoSawTheFace was a rocket man, a satellite jockey, and a mathematician. He was warm, brilliant, and often stubborn. Face was an old school noder who could be intensely old school in his culture and politics, and intensely accepting of the odd and offbeat in the way only someone who'd been to several nodermeets could really get. The man was a hedonist who cared, a prideful sort who didn't sneer at those from difficult or different walks of life. The man could be a walking stack of contradictions, but at heart, he was a man who loved a good cigar and the good things in life, and the challenge of a really good math problem.
Face believed in me when I didn't believe in myself, and it took years for me to accept the force of nature he claimed to see. Looking back through my inbox, the man was not short with encouragement, or exhortations to send me my latest address so he could send me a postcard or letter. Knowing now that he was slowly losing his sight, and of the challenges transitioning from sighted to blind can bring to communications I'm honored that he went to that kind of trouble for me.
The man could write - one only has to look at his node list to see that. But not just that: the man had the courage to pull his heart out and put it on paper, and the skill to make you bleed and weep along with it, or to laugh and be uplifted by the light he cast on the world. He could argue - good god, could he argue.
There's too many good memories of food and conversation, and getting to plumb the depths of that brilliant man's brain, but if I had to choose a memory, I'll remember him smoking cigars with custo and buddy Rob outside of the Bier Baron. I'll remember the beers we drank in that dim, beer can decorated basement, the fine conversation: the opera, the cream puffs, and Face, smiling and drinking his hefeweizen: holding court amongst some of the best story-tellers amongst my family and friends. It's an honor I'll never forget.
Godspeed, Face. May the nurses have been exceptionally fine, with double majors in astrophysics to match the medical training.