Funeral for a Friend

Chip Hackley was one of the best writers I knew, and also a gentleman in the truest sense of the word. At his funeral today, his pastor spoke about how Chip treated every person with dignity, and that is very, very true.

May God rest his soul.

Read a little bit more about Chip here -- and really, it is just a little. He did so much more in his life!

Chip was an avid outdoorsman. He loved canoeing and hiking and fishing. In fact, when I was writing a catalog for Old Town Canoe Co., I was at his desk every day, asking him to either teach me about canoeing or to tell me a story about one of his canoe trips, several of which were featured in the catalog in a fictionalized presentation.

And here's a poem that Chip wrote in 1995, which was printed on the back of his funeral bulletin. "Portage" refers to hiking from one river to another, usually with a backpack on your shoulders and one end of a canoe over your head, while your buddy (or son or wife or brother or coworker, in Chip's case) held up the other end.

My portage
is long
and the pack I've chosen
is so heavy that energy ebbs
with each struggling step
along the rocky path.
But now between the distant trees
a patch of sky
and a glimpse of blue water.
The end
and the beginning.

--Sparki