2025-0120M-2219 Austin, TX
Monday night before 10:19pm, I got a call from the one good friend who knew me when I met Carmel.
“Have you heard from Carmel?”, V asked. “I saw a post that she died.”
In that moment, I felt myself in between realities. One in which the post was true and the other in which it wasn’t. I found it difficult to accept that Carmel was dead. I had just exchanged birthday greetings with her a few months ago.
It’s now Tuesday as I write this. I have had time to verify from her son D that Carmel decided to leave this world. I am both in shock now and also in acceptance. Carmel impacted my life greatly during the time that I spent time with her. I met her a couple of months after my divorce in Santa Cruz. The first page of my Surfing the Multiverse book (https://surfingtheuniverse.com/2015/11/23/surfing-the-multiverse-increasing-your-happiness-one-universe-at-a-time/) was written while I was with her at UCSC. On my birthday in 2015, I wrote about her father’s death (https://surfingtheuniverse.com/2015/11/27/page-56-death-in-the-multiverse/).
Carmel summarized herself as “too complex and whimsical to summarize”. She loved variety, spontaneity, new adventures, learning new things, physical activity, fresh air, and meeting new people everywhere she went. She was best when improvising in the moment. She had an almost obsessive drive to squeeze the juice out of life and live life to its fullest. I just imagined Will Ferrell playing Gene Freckle in the famous SNL skit, More Cowbell.
Carmel loved to remember funny parts of a movie “just cuz I love to laugh”, she said. One of her favorite movies was Get Him to the Greek. This was guaranteed to satisfy her love of laughing.
Carmel, I’m grateful for all of the adventures we shared and happy memories we created. You continue to inspire me to live life to its fullest. RIP Carmel.
surfing the universe 
Beautiful memory of an equally beautiful lady. This memory is true to the time I was hanging out with Carmel. She was the Goddess Athena, wisdom and emotional truth, all prana expression every breath. A warrior of feminine freedom.
She was in charge the whole way.
goodby Carmel
LikeLike
Beautifully said. She was a very bright comet that lit those of us who knew her.
LikeLike