Knight Errant

Knight Errant

Of Craig, by his friend, Rob Stuart

I met Craig at the Springs Presbyterian Church, East Hampton, New York, in 2000. I learned immediately of his love of water and associations with it. He had a sailboat nearby on Three Mile Harbor, and he stayed on the boat in the summer while he rented his house for the season. He had been baptized in Accabonic Creek by the church, in 1995 by the pastor of the church at that time. He and I went clamming in Accabonic Creek. I heard from people in the church how much Craig helped out there, and his pleasing manner.

I visited Craig in Morehead City, where I met his mother, Jane, and Diane and her family. He showed me around the area, and it was obvious he continued to be happy near the water. He had established a massage therapy practice.

He and I continued to stay in touch when he moved from Morehead City and settled first in suburban Washington D.C., then in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. “Settled” is a relative word, because he traveled about. By bicycle. Occasionally he would show up at my front door in East Hampton, having cycled here. He would bring fixings for lunch, and we would sit out on my deck and catch up on his life, and mine. The visit was always a pleasure. He stayed overnight in a tent, once in my yard but other times, elsewhere. He had a way of his own.

He introduced me to his friend Michael at one point, and I heard of Bradley. He kept me informed later of his move to California, which was quite a trip. And of the places he visited there and where he stayed, and people he met, including friends Richard and Karen.

I know he had up-times and down-times, a buoyant spirit and a dark spirit, which were in the air of his friendships, and his family. Through it all, the bonds held, strong or tenuous, but not severed. I have kept in touch with Diane, and recently with Terry.

His death was a shock, unexpected, all the more because Craig was a good swimmer and in good physical shape from all that bicycling, and the work he had put into his alternate home in Harrisburg. That he died in water seems fitting, or at least natural, because of his affinity with water. So I was thinking, he was baptized in a creek here in the East, and sailed on our bay in East Hampton, then died in a bay in San Diego, in the West. A sadness, but perhaps in a way a completeness. Or completion. But still, I would say, too early to go.

I hold onto his smile and to the adventure of his errant ways, which were expressions of his independence and exuberant spirit. Ever challenged, ever challenging.