Remembering Rick P.

2026-09-25

My friend Rick P. died a few days ago. And intellectually I know that death is as much of a part of life as birth is, such is the curse of being a human. It is wild that we all know that we are going to die, if we were all cats we wouldn’t have that knowledge.

And this isn’t the first death in my life, 3 out of 4 of my grandparents died when I was a teen and my Uncle Craig B. died very young. I think these deaths happened when I was younger and didn’t fully understand how long life is and could be, before I really understood what it means to have kids, before I understood the possible life cycle of a human. Many of us, but not all of us, are born, get some kind of education, get married, have kids, our kids get old, and then we die. I am going to dub that the circle of life. But not all of us get married, not all of us have kids.

And Rick P. was one of those people in my life that didn’t have a wife or kids, he was just a guy that hung out and was helpful. He was one of those guys that really liked working on a project or doing some kind of self improvement. Some people really enjoy drinking beer, gossiping, or eating at restaurants. He didn’t really enjoy the first two, no beer or gossiping, he drank diet coke sometimes and sometimes coke with sugar, but he did sometimes do the last one. He really liked American and Japanese food, he like diners, hamburgers, black bear diner, dennys, in and out, mcdonalds, Chic-fil-a, etc. Those were his go to places when we got together.

But the most common thing we would do when we were together was a project. He helped me with so many that I am not going to be able to list them all but I will try:

• He bought me a razon when I was learning to shave
• He taught me to drive stick shift, that is the only reason I can do it today (and I still drive a stick shift sometimes)
• He helped me with a bunch of school projects
• He taught me to change engine oil
• He taught me a ton about cars
• When I crashed my Mini in Sacramento he helped me replace the engine and transition (it was a huge project)
• He helped me replace a shower in our previous house
• He helped me install electrical outlets in our current house

This was the kind of guy he was, he was really at home with a handy man type project. He used to be an electrician, always worked on his cars, and worked on security equipment a lot. 90% of the time when we met up it was to help him with a project or help me with a project, usually a house or car project.

I am not very religious but I think he affected me in a bunch of ways which changed me as a person and his teaching will ripple through me to my kids and friends and stuff. He really believed in doing things the right way and a certain way (I didn’t always agree with him) but he stuck to his values and was a good person. I will miss him dearly.

-Gary