Weddings, Deaths, and Weirdness
Jul. 8th, 2019 09:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tcpipWithout any doubt the big event of the weekend was Holly C., and Luke M.'s wedding on Saturday at Bakehouse Studios in Richmond and followed by the reception at Concrete Boots. The gothic aesthetic was strong throughout, which is quite unsurprising. Holly's outfit was really quite something, the rise of the black sun, and Luke was a very dapper Hobbit, albeit of the Tallfellow breed (his performance of "Into My Arms" at the reception was very charming). It was a great opportunity, as such events are, to catch up with a number of old friends whom we see but on occasions like this. In lieu of wedding gifts, donations to Edgar's Mission were encouraged, and it is mentioned here in the vague hope that someone else may follow the link and donate. Holly and Luke are, of course, have been a mighty fine couple of adventure, passion, and righteousness for many years already, and without a doubt that will continue for years to come.
Following the trajectory of joyous elation to sombre despair, I found out today that one of my friends at the estate, Norman Ireland, had passed away. We used to catch up on almost a daily basis on travels when he was teaching art and fashion at RMIT, whilst I was just around the corner at VPAC. A gently-spoken man with many wild and wonderful stories and a wicked sense of how to use politeness as a weapon. After his retirement he would often be in travels overseas (Thailand was a favourite haunt), so we didn't see as much of him as one would like. We caught up a couple of months ago, and he mentioned that he had just been through a period of illness, including a bad case of cellulitis, which is downright horrible as I know too well. Whilst he seemed good at that stage, mere amateur observation is not diagnosis and obviously, things went very bad.
Amidst these two extremes there was not banality, but weirdness, just to give a sense of the emotional roller-coaster I've been on for the past few days. Andy Staples, who has been involved in RPG game design, was mentioning the new edition of Chivalry & Sorcery, which has been around since the mid-1970s. I mentioned in passing whether he knew what had happened to Ed Hogg, who I had met on usenet in the late 1990s and thought quite highly of. He tagged a mutual friend in the Facebook conversation, who turned out to be Ed Hogg (a nom-de-net), who was rather surprised to discover that I had even named a character after him, whereas for me it resolved the twenty-plus year old mystery of "what happened to Ed Hogg?". It was a strange and beautiful discovery.
Following the trajectory of joyous elation to sombre despair, I found out today that one of my friends at the estate, Norman Ireland, had passed away. We used to catch up on almost a daily basis on travels when he was teaching art and fashion at RMIT, whilst I was just around the corner at VPAC. A gently-spoken man with many wild and wonderful stories and a wicked sense of how to use politeness as a weapon. After his retirement he would often be in travels overseas (Thailand was a favourite haunt), so we didn't see as much of him as one would like. We caught up a couple of months ago, and he mentioned that he had just been through a period of illness, including a bad case of cellulitis, which is downright horrible as I know too well. Whilst he seemed good at that stage, mere amateur observation is not diagnosis and obviously, things went very bad.
Amidst these two extremes there was not banality, but weirdness, just to give a sense of the emotional roller-coaster I've been on for the past few days. Andy Staples, who has been involved in RPG game design, was mentioning the new edition of Chivalry & Sorcery, which has been around since the mid-1970s. I mentioned in passing whether he knew what had happened to Ed Hogg, who I had met on usenet in the late 1990s and thought quite highly of. He tagged a mutual friend in the Facebook conversation, who turned out to be Ed Hogg (a nom-de-net), who was rather surprised to discover that I had even named a character after him, whereas for me it resolved the twenty-plus year old mystery of "what happened to Ed Hogg?". It was a strange and beautiful discovery.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-10 08:51 pm (UTC)I do love weddings when you know the bride and groom are solid friends, not just caught up in the romance, or simply looking for a catch, or just to settle. Be far fewer divorces if you could weed out those. I really like the idea of fixed-term renewable marriage contracts. No worse than forcing people to sign pre-nuptial agreements.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-12 01:24 am (UTC)I do recall meeting a woman a few years back who was quite lovely, but rather heavily involved in a rather fundamentalist religious bent. When I explained to her, jokingly, that my partner and I had been "living in sin" for several years, she nodded her head slowly, and responded "Ahh... A common-law marriage". You could almost hear the internal gears in her head working it out.
Don't mind at all being a commoner.