Let this year be remembered as the year of cancer, I once wrote.

This year, then, is the year of broken lives... the year of the survivors--

Behrang, a patchwork image of calamity pieced together through friends, loved ones, through the empty corners of that slowly emptying apartment, through the practical trivialities we waded through together following the sudden death of his wife...

Tahmaseb, who escaped the executions of post-Revolution Iran only to lose his wife to cancer, a lifetime, a grandchild later, in their beloved Berlin; who wrote of nothing but his Iran and his Farzaneh; whose short stay with us left a long mark on my life and my memory... whose kind, smiling eyes are unimaginable in grief...
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Raheleh, for whom I have no words--none--to express how sorry, how heartbroken, how hurt for you... how vividly I can imagine... how I can't bring myself to... how every letter trips over itself, sinks, implodes before it gets to the page
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Lost to us, now, but at peace

Shadi
Farzaneh
Gino

May you rest in the warmest, most golden calm

May your memory be blessed

i'll miss you(r laugh)
it won't be the same
don't be a stranger

all that.

If, by chance, I've missed somebody... if a reader here is not connected to me on one of the many channels I've now shared this, please visit our GoFundMe campaign for family friends who have suffered a terrible loss.

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...and to those who already have: Beyond words, thank you.