Twenty-nine years ago today we lost our brother to his mental illness.

I think of him often. For many reasons. When my demons are particularly ornery, we review all the ways I disappointed him and did him wrong and how if I had been a bit stronger I may have been able to pull him back from the edge one more time.

But these days mostly I think about the many many fellow humans who are spreading (or propagating) vicious lies and destroying lives daily in the name of greed and power. And that if the universe had any justice to it at all Carey would still be alive and the rest of these vile assholes would be flinging themselves off the nearest cliff.

When Carey took his own life he was in the middle of research that eventually led to important discoveries. He died as the AIDS crisis decimated the population and his goal (one of many) was to stop it however he could. He was ready, willing an able to give everything he had to changing lives. He was ALWAYS like this. Unencumbered, diligent, wise, and endlessly empathetic. The fact the miserable vermin blowing up democracy in North America are still breathing air and he is not is all the proof I ever needed that religions and gods are ridiculously useless. To me anyway.

Over the years I posted many things about Carey to FB. One of the first things I ever posted was his picture. So I guess it’s kind of fitting that my last post be about him too.

In 2016 I wrote a piece for The Walrus about us. I have reposted it to my BlueSky account if anyone is interested as FB no longer allows this kind of post.

Carey you would have contributed great things to this existence. You had faith in people but none in yourself. But you were wrong on both counts.