As we closed in on Minnesota, I started to drift off at the wheel. For the only time so far, I felt I needed to pull the caravan over and get Don to drive my car. I ended up sleeping for hours. It helped my mood even further; which was good because of a sudden shock at a gas station. According to the front page of the Star Tribune, a guy I knew in college, Wade Johnson, had also gone into filmmaking after graduation -- he had just been killed while filming a documentary about mountain climbing.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j9XeNbDfzG_-BTaVgvW1u7avC7dAD98MKACG2
I didn't know Wade well, but we'd crossed paths a couple of times over the years -- enough that I recognized his picture almost immediately. He was very outdoorsy, and worked at the climbing wall. I think I might have taken a lesson on rock climbing from him, once. We had a film class together, although I'm not sure we ever spoke. I'm pretty sure he cooked some food for a fundraiser that I attended at one point.
So, I suppose I really didn't know Wade much at all; but even now, in another lifetime and several years later, I still have a clear impression of someone who loved adventure, who had great enthusiasm for the natural world, and who was just generally a good sort of guy. To leave that impression, after our brief time together, speaks well of him.
And he was, I just learned, a fellow filmmaker. A filmmaker in search of the story on that mountain, killed by an avalanche when he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. According to the paper, he was trained and skilled at mountain safety; one expert was quoted as saying, "Sometimes [. . .] you just get unlucky."
What could be more tragic? Struck down by bad luck on the side of a mountain. Just pure bad luck.
Rest in Peace, Wade.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j9XeNbDfzG_-BTaVgvW1u7avC7dAD98MKACG2
I didn't know Wade well, but we'd crossed paths a couple of times over the years -- enough that I recognized his picture almost immediately. He was very outdoorsy, and worked at the climbing wall. I think I might have taken a lesson on rock climbing from him, once. We had a film class together, although I'm not sure we ever spoke. I'm pretty sure he cooked some food for a fundraiser that I attended at one point.
So, I suppose I really didn't know Wade much at all; but even now, in another lifetime and several years later, I still have a clear impression of someone who loved adventure, who had great enthusiasm for the natural world, and who was just generally a good sort of guy. To leave that impression, after our brief time together, speaks well of him.
And he was, I just learned, a fellow filmmaker. A filmmaker in search of the story on that mountain, killed by an avalanche when he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. According to the paper, he was trained and skilled at mountain safety; one expert was quoted as saying, "Sometimes [. . .] you just get unlucky."
What could be more tragic? Struck down by bad luck on the side of a mountain. Just pure bad luck.
Rest in Peace, Wade.
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