By Kate Cayley
On the day of my father David’s burial, a beautiful early summer day, my sister Rachael said to me at the grave, very quietly, “Our father was a lucky man.” I think he knew it.
One of the ways he was lucky was in how many things he loved.
He loved thinking through, not in abstraction but in embodiment. In his zest, he lived in his thinking. He taught me that thought is not arid, that language is connected to breath and to the body, that we live in language as we live in breath.
He loved music. He loved baseball, and hockey. He loved all birds. Now whenever I see a bird I think “hi David.” He loved all flowers. And he loved many people.
He was blessed in my mother, in his four children and who they married, in his seven grandchildren, in his work, and in his friends.
He first had his heart trouble in 2020, and it seemed like we might lose him then.
When that started, he called me. He told me very calmly and seriously that when we are born we step into time, and when we die we step out of it. That’s all.
He said “if you lose me, you will not lose me. We continue through memory, part of a chain of memory that includes all the people you have ever known and all the people who came before you, and will continue beyond your own life.” He said “If you lose me, the chain is still unbroken.”
But then we had another six years with him. The things that happened for my father in those six years is a good list.
- His third and biggest book on his friend and teacher Ivan Illich was published.
- He met his youngest grandchild.
- He travelled to Germany in 2024, and then Italy in 2025, for two Illich gatherings, which were joyful.
- He wrote and saw published his book on the CBC.
- His launch for the CBC book brought together old friends from different parts of his life, beloved colleagues, and his family, and it was deeply satisfying to him, a moment of knowing he had made something substantial, not only through the book but through the work of his life.
- In March we had an 80th birthday party for him, just for his large family, and while he disliked or perhaps slightly dreaded the idea of it, when it happened he said it felt like another moment of knowing you have made something.
- Those six years mean that all his grandchildren are old enough to remember him.
- And over the six years, he kept on writing. But he also had a lot of conversations and a lot of singing, and even though his walking was unsteady, he could get almost everywhere riding his bike.
It’s still hard not to feel rebellious. He died in the midst of singing a song with his bluegrass friends. It was a time when he was still thinking about the next thing, working on a new book. But that was always going to be true. He was always in the midst. He was always thinking toward the next thing.
Ivan Illich, who was so important to David, wrote, “if there is something like a political life to be, to remain for us, in this world of technology, then it begins with friendship.” David gave us his friendship. We’re lucky too.