Richard Savino 1945-1996
Nov. 15th, 2007 12:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deirdreToday's the 11th anniversary of my first husband's death.
I didn't get this until after he'd died, but Richard played a role with each person, trying to be who they wanted (or expected). I don't think he was trying to act, I think he just wanted to be liked and loved. Playing roles would strain him, because he wasn't being himself, so he'd try to find a variety of different roles to play in life. I mentioned this in my entry about my flight home.
Richard was a complicated person. He was in his first semester of grad school in anthropology when he died. He'd worked as a newspaper reporter, as a research chemist, as a consulting chemist, as a freelance writer, as a prison guard, as an assistant to the customs veterinarian, and as a teacher. He hand-calligraphied letters in Tengwar, and typed long letters to a friend about all kinds of things, including motorcycles. He left three sons by two ex-wives behind (though he had more than two ex-wives, I'm honestly not entirely certain of the number; no one is, which is why I count backward from n wives, where n >= 4).
His life started out a lie: his mother wasn't married, so his grandmother and step-grandfather legally adopted him, and he was raised believing that his mother was his elder sister. He wasn't told until his mother was on her deathbed. I believe he was in his 30s at the time.
Richard died the day before deer season opened, which was sad for him. He'd been in school the few years prior and hadn't gone deer hunting, and was finally planning to go again. Unsurprisingly, the other family living on the same property was the first to catch a deer that year -- the day after Richard died. Coincidence?
He once quoted another prison guard as having said (about something unspecified): "I don't know if it's cruel, but it sure as fuck is unusual." That describes Richard and his life pretty well. There was always some unusual twist and turn. Some of those may have been fictional.
Richard knew he would die young; in fact he'd written to his best friend that he expected to die in middle age of a brain hemorrhage. And he did. (For the record, the opening of my obit from a writing class: Deirdre Saoirse Moen died last week after falling into a crevasse on the Ross Ice Shelf. The 98-year-old woman had made six previous visits to Antarctica.)
I learned a lot about life by moving to Vermont, something prompted by Richard's presence there and his ties to his kids. However, I wouldn't trade that for my current life for anything. I will say that the process of being widowed is one of the suckiest things that can happen to one.
His favorite movie was Reds; the movie he never wanted to see again was Sleepless in Seattle, because the idea of being widowed was something he couldn't emotionally handle. A few days before his death, he made me promise that if anything should happen to him, I'd find someone I really loved and remarry. Some days, that unfulfilled promise was all that kept me going.
Which is why I'm very glad that I kept that promise. Rick has been a wonderful person to be with. I accused him of being the Web 2.0 of husbands.
I didn't get this until after he'd died, but Richard played a role with each person, trying to be who they wanted (or expected). I don't think he was trying to act, I think he just wanted to be liked and loved. Playing roles would strain him, because he wasn't being himself, so he'd try to find a variety of different roles to play in life. I mentioned this in my entry about my flight home.
Richard was a complicated person. He was in his first semester of grad school in anthropology when he died. He'd worked as a newspaper reporter, as a research chemist, as a consulting chemist, as a freelance writer, as a prison guard, as an assistant to the customs veterinarian, and as a teacher. He hand-calligraphied letters in Tengwar, and typed long letters to a friend about all kinds of things, including motorcycles. He left three sons by two ex-wives behind (though he had more than two ex-wives, I'm honestly not entirely certain of the number; no one is, which is why I count backward from n wives, where n >= 4).
His life started out a lie: his mother wasn't married, so his grandmother and step-grandfather legally adopted him, and he was raised believing that his mother was his elder sister. He wasn't told until his mother was on her deathbed. I believe he was in his 30s at the time.
Richard died the day before deer season opened, which was sad for him. He'd been in school the few years prior and hadn't gone deer hunting, and was finally planning to go again. Unsurprisingly, the other family living on the same property was the first to catch a deer that year -- the day after Richard died. Coincidence?
He once quoted another prison guard as having said (about something unspecified): "I don't know if it's cruel, but it sure as fuck is unusual." That describes Richard and his life pretty well. There was always some unusual twist and turn. Some of those may have been fictional.
Richard knew he would die young; in fact he'd written to his best friend that he expected to die in middle age of a brain hemorrhage. And he did. (For the record, the opening of my obit from a writing class: Deirdre Saoirse Moen died last week after falling into a crevasse on the Ross Ice Shelf. The 98-year-old woman had made six previous visits to Antarctica.)
I learned a lot about life by moving to Vermont, something prompted by Richard's presence there and his ties to his kids. However, I wouldn't trade that for my current life for anything. I will say that the process of being widowed is one of the suckiest things that can happen to one.
His favorite movie was Reds; the movie he never wanted to see again was Sleepless in Seattle, because the idea of being widowed was something he couldn't emotionally handle. A few days before his death, he made me promise that if anything should happen to him, I'd find someone I really loved and remarry. Some days, that unfulfilled promise was all that kept me going.
Which is why I'm very glad that I kept that promise. Rick has been a wonderful person to be with. I accused him of being the Web 2.0 of husbands.