To this day, I can't eat a walnut without thinking about the time Tony and Steve were helping Grandma make cookies. She needed them to shell the walnuts, and Tony decided it would be more fun if they pretended they were performing brain surgery - trying to extract a perfect half walnut from the shell without breaking it. I was probably five years old, and Tony must have been about twelve. He was already exhibiting his awesome, funny, macabre sense of humor. I'm so grateful you were different and interesting. I will never forget you.

Tony and I met years ago when I was painting in a cafe up the street from where he was painting plein-air a Castro Victorian. We chatting and hung out while he worked on that painting, and frequnetly in the 1990s as we both struggled to be productive artists in SF. I knew watching him paint that Victorian, and through the years I knew Tony, that if I ever opened a gallery, he'd be one of the first artists I'd invite to show there. Well, I'm opening the gallery in March 2008 and Tony was the first artist friend I started really searching for online. I found this tribute and my tears today are fresh, learning that he is no longer paiting down the block or somewhere across town, or even down in Mexico. I wish I had had the chance to show Tony how much I respected him and his art. I regret that my gallery has come too late to feature part of Tony's beautiful vision with the world.

Just the other night, I was trying to sleep and for some reason I remembered how when mom and dad were first divorced, you used to drive me to school in the morning. I was in the sixth grade and we had moved out of the district. I was to finish out the year at that school and start a new one in the fall. I was 11 and you were 18. It was just such a bad time in our family but I remember really enjoying those rides to school, just hanging out with you and listening to the radio. You loved the song that went "nobody's gonna break my stride, nobody's gonna slow me down..." it was 1981. Shortly thereafter you moved to the city but you still wrote me letters all the time, and I still have every one. I love you Tony!