There’s already a lot happening this year, and not all of it is good. Last week’s tragedy concerning the Ukrainian airplane that was shot down by Iran has been a deplorable state of affairs. Iran finally admitted that it shot down the plane. As to be expected, there have been several protests in Tehran against the government. People are demanding that the Supreme Leader Khamenei steps down. In the meantime, the Iran newspaper released the names of the victims. I hope that the families of the victims find some resolution to this horrible turn of events.
Khamenei’s position is eroding even though there was support for him during the disgraceful volley between the United States and Iran. Iran, in its defense, claimed that the accident was a result of the actions of the “adventurist” United States. I’m not sure how to interpret that, but I agree that the United States has had a definite hand in this unfortunate situation. I expect that there will be a close examination of how the tragedy unfolded and perhaps, governments all over the world will take steps to ensure that military actions won’t lead to civilian tragedy.
As I was pondering these events, I got a phone call from the wife of one of the software engineers that I used to manage. I almost dropped the phone as she told me that Bruce died. He had a heart attack as he was moving boxes during the remodel of their home. This was undoubtedly the last thing I expected for the start of this new year.
Bruce’s wife, Jan, called me because until recently, I was his manager. Bruce and I worked together for over five years. He commuted a long way to get into work, and as a consequence, he started work later in the day than the other software engineers. He also left the office later. I would always see him there at his desk as I left the job for the day. Although his cubicle was sparse and didn’t have many personal items, he filled that space as no one else could.
He was a very tall man and loved to play basketball with some of the other engineers at work. He also loved to travel and talk about his adventures wherever he went into the world. He visited many different countries in all of the different continents in the world. His latest trip was to witness the total eclipse of the sun last year in Chile. He produced a beautiful photo album book on the trip. He and his wife saw a lot of animals and terrain in Chile.
He also loved to work on gnarly, complicated software engineering projects. He liked solving issues and finding ways to bring new technology to life at work. He was a quiet guy and didn’t brag very much about his accomplishments. I don’t think that other managers understood what a jewel he was, but that didn’t matter. The team and I knew it as well as other people that worked with him. Perhaps, others saw him as an uncut stone. That was their loss.
Our more significant loss is that he is gone to us now. Our gentle giant has left our plane of existence. Perhaps, he’ll be solving some of the more significant problems of the universe for us. Selfishly, I hope so.
Bruce: We loved you, and we know that you loved us. May you travel and explore the universe in peace.
This is a photo that Bruce took featuring a sunset from Half Moon Bay. This sunset was as beautiful as he was. Bruce, thank you for gracing us in this world.