John Perry Barlow - Euology for Cynthia Horner

[Stanton McCandlish <mech@eff.org>]

Forwarded message:
Date: Sat, 23 Apr 1994 12:05:36 -0800
From: John Perry Barlow <barlow@eff.org>

I know that news of her death is circulating the Net and I'm getting an
incredible outpouring of shock and sympathy. For any good it might do, I
hope you will post this to some of the places where news of her death has
appeared. I mean it to stand as her gravestone in the virtual world.


Cynthia Horner's Eulogy
read by John Perry Barlow at her funeral April 22, 1994 in Nanaimo,
Vancouver Island, BC..

I don't know most of you, and I envy the many among you who were graced
with Cynthia all her life. I only knew her a little while.  We spent the
last glorious year of her life together. It was the best year of my life
and, I firmly believe, it was the best year of her life too.

Last Sunday morning, during the last hour we spent together, we were
playing with a cat which strangely green eyes.

She looked at me with her own beautiful green eyes and said, "You know,
James Joyce said that green eyes were a sign of the supernatural." The way
she said it seemed pointed and meaningful. And hope makes me want to
believe it all the more meaningful now.

I don't know that I believe in the supernatural, but I do believe in
miracles, and our time together was filled with the events of magical
unlikelihood. I also believe that sometimes angels live among us, hidden
within our fellow human beings. I'm convinced that such an angel dwelled in
Cynthia. I felt this presence often in Cynthia's lightness of being, in her
decency, her tolerance, her incredible love. I never heard Cynthia speak
ill of anyone nor did I ever hear anyone speak ill of her. She gave joy and
solace to all who met her.

I feel her angel still, dancing around the spiritual periphery, just beyond
the sight of my eyes, narrowed as they are with the glare of ordinary
light. Her graceful goodness continues to surround me, if less focused and
tangible than before.

With a care that was appropriately reverential, Cynthia and I built a love
which was an inspiration to all who came into contact with it. We felt,
quite consciously, that it was our gift to the world. We wanted to show the
hesitant the miracle that comes when two people give their hearts
unconditionally, honestly, fearlessly, and without reservation or
judgement. We wanted to make our union into a message of hope, and I
believe we did, even though we knew that hearts opened so freely can be
shattered if something should go wrong. As my heart is shattered now.

So among the waves of tragedy which have crashed on me with her death is a
terror that our message of hope has been changed into a dreadful warning.
But I am here to tell you that had I known at the beginning that I would be
here today doing this terrible thing, I would still have loved her as
unhesitatingly, because true love is worth any price one is asked to pay.

The other message we wished to convey was one of faith in the essential
goodness and purpose of life. I have always felt that no matter how
inscrutable its ways and means, the universe is working perfectly and
working according to a greater plan than we can know.

In the last few days, I have had to battle with the fear that everything is
actually just random, that the universe is a howling void of meaningless
chaos, indifferent to everything that I value. All hope has at times seemed
unjustified to me.

But groundless hope, like unconditional love, is the only kind worth having.

It's true name is faith. As it is a shallow faith which goes untested, so
it is that if we can keep our faith through this terrible test, we will
emerge with a conviction of incredible and enduring strength. And this
faith will become Cynthia's greatest gift to us. If we can build with our
lives a monument to her light and her love, she will not have died in vain,
and her death will become as much a miracle as was her life.




-- 
Stanton McCandlish * mech@eff.org * Electronic Frontier Found. OnlineActivist
"In a Time/CNN poll of 1,000 Americans conducted last week by Yankelovich
Partners, two-thirds said it was more important to protect the privacy of
phone calls than to preserve the ability of police to conduct wiretaps.
When informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they opposed it."
- Philip Elmer-Dewitt, "Who Should Keep the Keys", TIME, Mar. 14 1994