19-02 2023 18:10
wrote:
Unlike many of you who have posted here, I knew John personally rather than professionally. We first met in Rome, where he and Megan were both working on a project and the three of us had dinner. I came to love him for his intelligence, kindness, dry wit, and openness to making Megan’s friends his own. His curiosity and love of his profession were visible even to an outsider. I can still see him discussing an insect with a 3- or 4-year-old Will in a British garden. I was visiting them when he captured a swarm of bees for his hives and will always be glad to have been able to observe him at that work. I regret that their timing of one visit to us in Virginia was off by just a few days for the emergence of the 17-year cicadas: that cycle was especially dramatic, every dog in the area gained 2 to 5 pounds eating them! He shared with me and my husband some of his love for his adopted country of England, introducing us to areas less travelled by tourists and all the more delightful for it. We also discovered the beauty of the Annisquam River in Massachusetts through John, which he loved as well. I am grateful that I got to know him, and grateful to those of you who have written about the professional side of his life, so that I can now appreciate that as well. His loss is felt deeply and widely: I only wish we all had had more time with him.
19-02 2023 18:10
wrote:
Unlike many of you who have posted here, I knew John personally rather than professionally. We first met in Rome, where he and Megan were both working on a project and the three of us had dinner. I came to love him for his intelligence, kindness, dry wit, and openness to making Megan’s friends his own. His curiosity and love of his profession were visible even to an outsider. I can still see him discussing an insect with a 3- or 4-year-old Will in a British garden. I was visiting them when he captured a swarm of bees for his hives and will always be glad to have been able to observe him at that work. I regret that their timing of one visit to us in Virginia was off by just a few days for the emergence of the 17-year cicadas: that cycle was especially dramatic, every dog in the area gained 2 to 5 pounds eating them! He shared with me and my husband some of his love for his adopted country of England, introducing us to areas less travelled by tourists and all the more delightful for it. We also discovered the beauty of the Annisquam River in Massachusetts through John, which he loved as well. I am grateful that I got to know him, and grateful to those of you who have written about the professional side of his life, so that I can now appreciate that as well. His loss is felt deeply and widely: I only wish we all had had more time with him.
