Scott Cunningham – 20 Years Passing

Scott Cunningham – 20 Years Passing

It’s been twenty years since my brother Scott died. Twenty years. Which means my youngest son will be twenty this year. How did this happen? (For I am still a mere seventeen myself.)

My brother Scott Cunningham

I remember the day. It was a Saturday; my husband had two shows that day in Hollywood, and I had just been lazing around the house, being pregnant and happy and playing with my two year old. Until that afternoon, when my parents called.

I couldn’t believe it and yet it was utterly believable. The last time I had seen Scott, my heart had broken, and I will spare you the details. The time before that was in January, and we’d gone to lunch. Our conversation ranged over many topics and lunch, as I remember, took hours. I wish now I had recorded our conversation.

Anyway, the phone rang and my world shifted. It had happened to me before; the year I turned twenty, both my cousin Lori and a dear friend named Mark had died. Two separate, tragic instances separated my months and geography; both of which my parents had called to tell me about.

But those paled in comparison.

As Rosamund Pilcher said in her novel Coming Home, and I’m paraphrasing; Until you were told a loved one had died, they were there, living their lives, going about their business. It was the telling that killed. That last sentence has stayed with me. Haunted me, because it is true.

We knew his death was coming; it had been a long haul, three years of decline. Three years of giving our love, doing our best to banter the way we always did while hiding our shock at how thin he grew. Three years of feeling him slipping away. So by March we were taking it a day at a time.

Then I got the call.

In 1993, we had pagers. So in my grief, I paged my husband, who had to go on stage just then (in a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream), so he thrust the pager at his friend Paul, and said call her. Paul called me and I told him about Scott; Paul had been at our wedding, and he had met my brother. Paul was on one side of the stage when Tom looked at him – and from Paul’s expression, Tom knew.

I cannot do justice to Scott, for I am only a sister, one he fought with, laughed with, at times protected, and loved. But here are some places you can go to hear from people who knew him, probably better than I.

Donald Michael Kraig wrote this article on Scott.  The Llewellyn Worldwide Publications site has his books listed, and they’re all on Amazon as well. And someone put up this video that Scott did on YouTube and while I normally wouldn’t do this, here’s a link. Because this is so totally Scott, lol.

And we can’t forget the Wikipedia site.

Two of the books I love:

The Magical Household by Scott Cunningham and David Harrington

and Whispers of the Moon by David Harrington and deTraci Regula,

which is the biography they did of him.

 

 

 

 

 

Though, seriously, all of his books show a side of Scott I only barely grazed as we were growing up. We shared an apartment for a little while; but through our childhood, we shared a bond that I feel will never be broken.

My older brother Greg and I miss him, and we cling perhaps tighter to each other with one of us gone, so long ago now.

The moon is full, Spring is here, and it’s been twenty years since Scott’s passing. But I like to think he’d still recognize me, even with my thinning hair and thickening body, for my smile is still as bright and my arms still hug tight. I shall go outside into the moonlight tonight, and pour some wine into the soil for him.

Hug those you love, for our time is short in this world. A last note: I know I’m not the only one who has lost a sibling/spouse/parent/friend/cousin. As Gregor Caine says, “We all have our dead.” May we honor those who have gone before us, and love and cherish those who are still with us.

~ Until the next time. ~

~oOo~

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