Mike Richmond

Dear Cindy:

I live in San Francisco, and your brother was my roommate our final year at school, and we lived across from eachother at Phi Kapp before that. He was one of my best friends. Your brother was amazing, and I am so sorry and filled with grief at your family's loss. My family's and my prayers continue to be with you all.

I met Keith in the Spring of 1988 at UCLA. He was rowing crew a lot then, but we had lots of fun. We became good friends in the fall of '88 when we both moved into the house together. Keith and I had a great time in college. While we were "fraternity brothers," I can tell you he was much more special to me. Having no brothers, just two sisters (just like Keith), he was like a brother I never had growing up. While he always maintained his strong, "tough," exterior, he was a person I could talk to about anything. And he was understanding, empathetic, and reassuring. He was truly an important presence in my life. I miss him very much.

I got the phone call about his fall [Keith's accidental fall from a fire escape] in college at the end of Christmas break and I drove down right away. I know Mike Buckingham was with your Dad, reading to Keith, etc. Believe me, Mike was doing that on behalf of all of Keith's friends. I was very proud of your brother's recovery.

After graduation, we kept in close touch. He visited me in San Francisco. My Dad had a stroke just after college was over and I went home to be with him. My Dad loved talking to Keith when he would visit. My Dad was an NU alum (born and raised in St. Charles) , and Keith was interested in going there at the time. My Dad had lots of college buddies from New Trier, and they talked about all sorts of stuff. My Mom loved Keith very much, and the first time I cried was when I told her and she cried too.

Your brother had an amazing capacity to relate to anyone. His charisma overwhelmed even the surliest of any lot. I visited Keith in Pasadena, and then again in Las Vegas. My visit to Vegas, spring of 1994 I think, was great. Two stories stand out: One night we were in Henderson, where the locals in the know go to game, to play craps. Keith had this key-chain that was a translucent sphere with an eyeball floating inside. The crap game was getting an little boring, people were throwing chips on the table, saying "odds on 6," etc. So Keith throws his keychain on the table and says "eye-ball odds on six." The casino employee looked up at him with the funninest and most astonished look I have ever seen, while the entire table pauses, then erupts in laughter. It was so funny, so perfect, and so Keith. Everytime I see one of those key chains at a gas station or something, I start laughing uncontrollably.

Also, Keith taught me to fly fish on that trip. We drove to the Owens River Valley to fish. He was a fantastic teacher to say the least. I caught my first fish, a rainbow trout, on a royal coachman fly. Keith was especially proud my first fish was on a royal coachman, and he encouraged me to tell everyone if it ever came up. Toward the end of our first day we were fishing in the Owens, wading in waist deep water with reeds on the bank behind us. He was upstream from me and yells, "Hey Richmond, look!" I turned around and there was an otter floating on his back as he passed us. I looked at the otter and he stared directly back into my eyes. All of a sudden he dives straight under the water. I thought the water monster was going to attack me. and I yell "Keith, HELP," and I scurry into the reeds, falling all over myself. Needless to say, the otter was likely more scared of me, but Keith just laughed and always teased me about the killer otter.

I feel very fortunate Keith came to spend the summer in San Francisco to work at Genentech. We hung out at his apartment in the Haight alot. We had alot of fun. I begged him to come back after graduation. We fished, went to dinner, bars, baseball games, etc. I treasure those more recent memories. He is a friend of mine forever, despite the fact we will lose touch for the next 50 or 60 years. No time or space could take away my memories of my friend Keith, or my belief I will see him again in Heaven; our friendship and my love for him are eternal.

I spoke to Keith last in February. We were going to run a marathon together. I wanted to fly back and run "Grandma's" marathon with him in May or June, but Keith was having trouble getting training in (he would only run when it was over 20 degrees outside) (as a California Kid, I don't think I have ever felt air that cold!), so we were going to run the Twin Cities marathon later in the summer.

I have just spent 1/2 an hour at work writing this, and I feel like I haven't even touched the surface of sharing with you how your brother touched my life. He made me feel good about myself for having a friend as cool as him. I will never forget your brother. ever.

Sincerely,
Mike Richmond

The time since learning of Keith's death has been a very difficult time for all of us. So many questions that we'd like to have answered that will never be answered. Although each of us will find a different way of dealing with Keith's death, I found it helpful when a mutual friend of ours posed to me the question: "How would Keith want us to feel about his death?" This question reminded me of a conversation Keith and I had last fall that I wanted to share with you.

One weekend in November Keith and I were out drinking with two other friends of his when his friend and I got into a conversation about hunting ducks and how one felt after shooting a duck. As a non-hunter I could only imagine that it was a hard thing to do and one would feel a variety of emotions. To my surprise the guy with whom I was speaking told me that he felt nothing. I found this hard to believe and turned to Keith for a second opinion. Keith thought about the question a moment and looking at his eyes I could see him reflecting on the situation. He smiled a bit sadly and said that it made him feel "a little sad." I didn't probe further at the time, but his response struck me and was something I've thought of again since learning of Keith's death.

When Keith mentioned that he felt sad I'm sure that he felt sad because the duck was a beautiful living creature that died too soon, before it was ready, before all the possibilities of its life were live out. This would have touched Keith. But in the same breath Keith didn't just say "sad", but rather "a little sad." And I think that he phrased it in this way as he knew that the death of the bird was not meaningless - Keith would eat the duck and by so doing it would give him sustenance and become part of him. He would also remember the experience of being in the outdoors and hunting with his friends and by so doing the duck's life would add to his. In such a sense the bird's death was meaningful and added to Keith's life.

As all of us can relate I found that my time with Keith has added so much to my own life. Our times together were invariably fun, sometimes a bit crazy, but always provided laughs and good memories. Keith was and is someone who I will always look up to as a role model about how to live life exploring new interests and accomplishing the goals you set out for yourself. If Keith wanted to give sky diving a try, he went out and did it. When Keith wanted to lose 20 pounds, he didn't just put it on his list of New Year's resolutions, he went ahead and did it.

And when I think again about the question "How would Keith want us to feel about his own death" I think his answer might be "a little sad." Sad of course that he is gone, but only a little sad because we remember the good times we had and know that he is still with us and will continue to be a part of our lives. His life was meaningful and adds to the richness of ours.

-Curt Jennewine

Craig Sahli

Hello,
As a friend of Keith's, I thought I would share some of the fabulous memories and moments we had together. I met Keith on the very first day of school at Kellogg in September 1996. In an introductory session Keith, Homer Luther and myself all spoke of our passion for fly fishing. Soon we were meeting each other in our classes, in the hallways and at social events exchanging stories of our fishing adventures. Keith had fished throughout the West. Homer had caught giant fish in Argentina. Keith was the first that fall to take a trip to Racine, Wisconsin to fish for steelhead. Homer and I jealously followed just days later only to get skunked. It was Keith's idea to take a trip to the Perre Marquette River in Michigan. We picked an early November weekend and hoped for good weather. The Perre Marquette has transplanted Skamania River Steelhead from Washington State that are famous for they're fighting stamina. The weekend was an absolute blast from start to finish. However, it was the company and not the fishing that made the memory. Homer, Chris (Keith's roommate), Peanut , Keith and I were not rewarded with either good weather or good fishing. Over the two days we caught only a few fish and no steelhead. But the bond was formed, my new friends were real fishermen. Despite freezing cold, eight inches of snow in eight hours and no fish, no one even thought to complain. We were out fishing and that was all that really mattered.

In the spring of 1997, as soon as the weatherman reported the potential for a weekend of sunshine, Keith and I headed for the spring creeks around the town of Finley in Southwest Wisconsin. Keith and I talked almost nonstop on both legs of the 5-hour drive to and from Finley. I was absolutely impressed with his vision of his future, his focus on the medical industry and his mastery of the associated recruiting process. I distinctly remember wishing that I could get anywhere as near as focused and organized as Keith.

Keith and I had a fair weekend of fishing around Finley. Keith would speed through the countryside while I tried to interpret the almost useless maps we had of the county roads. It was here that I first noticed how fast Keith could put on his waders, vest, boots and string up his rod. I would look up from tying my shoes and he would be standing there patiently waiting, staring intently toward the water, ready to fish.

On one very small creek, Keith spent more than 3 hours trying to catch this huge rainbow that could plainly be seen from the bank. In the time he worked for this fish, I had ranged the entire length of the fishable water. I probably landed half a dozen fish, each time shouting my success back to Keith. He was in a world of his own, I'd bet that he cast a hundred times and changed presentation every 10th cast. Finally just before we absolutely had to leave, he caught the fish. We measured the fish against his rod and before we could get a picture, I accidentally dropped the fish back in the water. Keith was not mad, he had won and everyone there (we were the only people around except for the fish) knew it.

Keith and I ate dinner that night in a bar in downtown Finley. After dinner we were invited to play in the house card game by a group of regular bar-goers. Neither Keith nor I knew how to play this game. The regulars were dumbfounded. They immediately wanted to know where we were from and what were we doing in Finley. We spent the next hour laughing with them about their card game and laughing at anyone who would drive all the way from Chicago to Finley for the fishing.

When we learned of Homer's impending wedding in Jackson Hole, Wyoming in June 1997, Keith and I hatched a plan to turn the wedding into a fishing weekend. We told our summer employers that we would need the third Friday of our summer employment off, so that we could attend this very important wedding. Keith and I met in Salt Lake City on Thursday and drove all the way to Idaho Falls, Idaho that night. The next day we got insider information (after we spent a ton of money) from the local Fly Shop. We proceeded to Ashton, Idaho (the seed potato capital of the world! Keith absolutely loved the saying this over and over), off the main highway next to a potato field and then down an unimproved dirt road that no subcompact car should ever travel. At the end of the journey, Keith drove the car while I directed him over the biggest rocks.

I will never forget that day on the Henry's Fork. We had the whole river to ourselves. We could see fish rising all over the river from where we parked the car. Keith was again ready in a flash but waited patiently as I clumsily got my gear together. The river was bubbling with fish and we caught as many as we could. At one point in the day, you couldn't look down river or into the wind because the Mayfly's were so thick they would fly in your eyes and mouth.

We had set a deadline of 4 in the afternoon to pack up our stuff and head for Jackson Hole so that we could attend the grooms dinner. We packed up as planned and stopped at a fast-food restaurant in Ashton for a quick soda. Neither Keith nor I really wanted to go. We sat at the counter brainstorming 'white lies' that we could tell Homer to get out of the rehearsal dinner so that we could stay and fish. Finally, we decided to call and claim that we were halfway to Jackson when we remembered that we left a rod sitting by the river. I thought up the lie, so Keith had to make the phone call. He was very courteous on the phone and they were so understanding and apologetic. Keith was bright red, we absolutely howled with laughter when the call finally ended. We really thought they bought our story!! Like a pair of kids released early from school, we drove back to the water, parked by the road, ran to the river and fished past sunset. Had there been a larger moon, we would have fished all night.

It turns out that everyone in Homer's family is a fisherman or fisherwoman. Not one of them believed our story. The next day at the reception, they kept asking, "so, lost your rod huh?, how was the fishing?."

On Easter weekend in 1998, I got my last chance to fish and hunt with Keith. We traveled to South Texas and fished for Red fish in the Gulf of Mexico near Port Arthur. We had another wonderful time on this trip. In fact, I have only 4 pictures on my desk and walls at work. The first three are pictures of my wife and children. The fourth is one of Homer, Keith, Christopher Wright, Nick Konstantinou and myself posing with our fish in Port Arthur.Ý

Rechelle (my wife) and I would bring our son Jake to Kellogg social events. Keith was always part of our little circle. He would play with Jake and shoot the breeze with the "old married people". He was the first person at Kellogg to put Rechelle at ease by calling her by her childhood nickname 'Red' and consistently inquired about her and Jake.Ý

Because Keith was not moving to the West, Rechelle and I had promised to designate a room in our house as his. I called him in early October and told him that we had finally found a large enough home and that he would have to come out to choose one of the extra rooms as his own. Keith was planning a trip this summer to Sun Valley, Idaho. Together we were going to work on our graduate Fly Fishing degrees on the famous waters of Silver Creek.

I have met a tremendous number of people in my journey through life. I however, have only had the opportunity to really know a handful. Keith is a treasured friend and gifted fisherman. I was really looking forward to more adventures and getting to know him even better. I know that every time I pull on my fishing gear and string my rod, he will be there, patiently waiting and looking at the water. Keith, you and your family are in our prayers every night.

Very Respectfully Yours,
Craig, Rechelle, Jake and Tara Sahli

Dear Cindy, Carrie, Mr. and Mrs. Loehr, and Keith's friends,

Just as I offer you all my deepest condolences in the loss of a cherished son, brother, and friend, I must also tell you how fortunate you were to have known Keith so well for so long.

There are only a handful of memories my mind immediately springs to when I think of childhood. The one that best embodies the unbridled silliness and joy of that time - and therefore, always my favorite - is of me and my best friend, a tall kid with dark, weary eyes and a famous smile, swinging back and forth in the schoolyard at St. Alexis, trying to call out to each other each time we pass, but passing too fast so our words die on the wind.
"Ma...!""Ke....!" "Ma...!" "Ke...!"

It went on for a good five minutes, and we laughed ourselves silly the whole time, and for a long time afterwards, as school kids will do. It remained our private joke until fourth grade, when my family moved away. I missed Keith, but we were young, and kids don't dwell on loss. We filled up our young lives with new playmates, as school kids will do. My memories of Keith are frozen in time. He's the kid who could skate better than me, could play kickball better than me, could play guitar better than me, and never once let me feel like he knew it.

I'm looking now at a picture of an exceptionally tall fourth-grader with a receding hairline and the same dark, weary eyes and the same famous smile, holding some spotted green salmon. And I'm feeling the same sense of regret - only now multiplied exponentially -- that I have every year around Christmas, when Mom gets a card from Carol and we get to hear this year's update. The regret that I didn't get to go to high school with that guy, didn't get to drink beer with that guy or talk about girls with that guy. Didn't get to see that guy at my wedding. Didn't get to show him pictures of my kids.

You are all so lucky. And so am I. We'll see him again some day, I know. I hope they have beer in heaven.

Ke...!

With love, tears and sympathy,
Mark Houser