i'm so heartbroken about this. crushed doesn't even begin to describe the feeling of loss, devastation. and i didn't even know any of this till a few days ago. i've been so busy with my own personal crap (elderly dying family members and my own health issues) i haven't even been reading the newspapers many days. and i've been out of the downtown/club kid/party scene for some years, so i'm no longer close to anyone who would have told me this terrible news.
i've known and loved dean since he helped me move into my first dorm room at weinstein hall at nyu in the fall of 1980. and we hit it off right away. if you've ever read his old diaries (at the velvet mafia site) i'm not the girl whose mother played vera on alice. i am, was, her roommate. the other crazy beverly hills punk girl.
i had lost touch with him for a long time, maybe almost 10 years. but i found him on myspace, about this time last year and emailed him. and he wrote me back and could not have been more sweet or welcoming. we bonded over our memories, and the death of our mothers to the same horrible disease, our mututal love of asian boys, and many other things as well. i know he was very busy, but he was so kind and generous that he never didn't have time to write me back. and we corresponded a great deal over the past year. and i went, with my uptight corporate husband, to a few of the 'reading for filth' performances over the summer. i even brought him some star shaped pasties as a gift, in lieu of flowers. i thought he could wear them to a party. but, instead he used them to decorate his macbook. that made me so happy.
ironically, in the early summer months i was having a lot of medical tests. it was nothing life threatening. but he became so concerned he called me in a panic. i know that he was hurt, felt terrible guilt, that he had missed the opportunity to say goodbye to our other dear college friend james lyons before his death in april. and he didn't want that to happen again with me. i assured him i was going to be fine, and he seemed very relieved. i suppose now it was i who should have been more worried about him.
i was so thrilled and delighted to have him back in my life. i suppose i should be grateful that i got this year, at least. truly, it was a great gift. but this stings me to my core, and i will miss him terribly. and i am also very sad that i missed his memorial, and would very much like to attend if there is ever another. i loved him very dearly. and my heart goes out to his sister in particular. i don't think we ever met, but he spoke so highly of her. and i can't imagine the grief of losing such a wonderful mother and such a wonderful brother in such a short time.
RIP hun. i loved you very much, and will never forget you. i think i will have to go steal some dangly chandelier earrings in your honor. <333