Things change: Tom & I split in 2001 and for a while it was just me & Chuck. Together, Chuck & I have stayed with almost every one of our close friends’ houses as a unit. We are lucky to have such gracious people in our lives who accepted that my love interest was 15lbs of fur and meowed like a drunken sailor.
Chuck saw more of the United States than most if its inhabitants. Together we went on a 6-week roadtrip from Spokane to Leavenworth to the Canadian Border, Seattle, Portland, Crater Lake, the Eastern side of California, Lake Tahoe, Sacramento, Davis, San Francisco, Highway 1 and Monterey where we stayed for 4 years with our new best friend, Justin Lewis. Then, we three trekked to Arizona (through Navajo & Hopi Nations), Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, and – finally – Rhode Island.
For what has been close to the last twenty years of my life I have had Chuck with me or very close to me and I miss him terribly. He died naturally and peacefully. We are fortunate to have been able to be with him through his entire passage and grateful to have known him. He was an incredibly soulful cat.
0 replies on “Charles "Chuck" Marion-Lewis: 1989-2007”
What a lovely tribute to a life-long friend. I’m so sorry for your loss. Namaste’.
The Bardo Prayer for Chuck, my sweet little friend…
Oh Buddhas and Bodhisattvas abiding in all directions,
Endowed with great compassion,
Endowed with foreknowledge,
Endowed with divine eye,
Endowed with love,
Affording protection to sentient beings,
Please come forth through the power of your great compassion,
Please accept these offerings, both actually presented and mentally created.
Oh Compassionate Ones, you who possess
The wisdom of understanding,
The love of compassion,
The power of doing divine deeds,
And of protecting in incomprehensible measure,
Chuck is passing from this world to the next,
he is taking a great leap,
The light of this world has faded for him,
he has entered solitude with their karmic forces,
he has gone into a vast silence,
he is borne away by the great ocean of birth and death …..
Oh Compassionate Ones, protect Chuck who is defenseless. Be to him like a mother and father.
Oh Compassionate Ones, let not the force of your compassion be weak, but aid them.
Let Chuck not go into the miserable states of existence.
Forget not your ancient vows.