Hi. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Andy, and my history with David began when I moved into the house across the street from his, back when we were both in the fourth grade in Modesto. My wife, Deanna just pointed out to me last night that it's been 50 years. A full half century. Not a bad run, I suppose, as friendships go. But with friends like David, you just never quite get enough.

For those of you who do know me, and there are a lot of you here - well, I can only guess that the collective histories of friendship that brought us all here must add up to something like several centuries! Maybe dozens of centuries. I guess I like thinking of it that way because it's a way of quantifying, albeit insufficiently, how much David has given to us all.

Among the good many other great old friends here today, many go back nearly as far as David, or even further. And there are a lot of others here who I don't yet know, or I've only recently met. But something struck me in the past few days, and while I was here last week - and that is the awesome consistency of the character of the multitudes of people that David's friendship has gathered and the family that he and Kathleen and Rosa and Willie have created. And I got the amazing feeling that to have known David well, is to a great extent, to know a good deal about his other friends, whether you've actually met them or not. So there are a lot of great people, friends and family here today, and more who couldn't be here. And David - and Kathleen - and their kids - have done that.

So it was 50 years ago when I stepped out onto the large driveway of the new house my family had just moved us into, in a neighborhood I didn't yet know. I'd spotted these two other kids roller-skating across the street, so I must have gone outside in my typical shy 9-year-old way to stand around looking friendless and forlorn. I thought the other two kids looked like pretty cool guys, and I KNEW I was a dork, but - hey - I WAS the rightful lord of a much larger driveway than they had for skating on, and I wasn't above using it as social leverage! So it wasn't long before they skated on over to check me out and introduce themselves - as Dennis Motoulewicz, the undisputed coolest guy on the block, and David Threlfall. And from such humble beginnings are the greatest of friendships born.

Now, I'm not going to run through the entire history of our childhoods, despite the countless great stories it holds. Many of you were there living it with us anyway, or have already heard it before. And likewise, we surely all have equally great stories to cherish and share, and which will no doubt all confirm an amazing consistency to our perceptions of such a never-to-be-duplicated friend as David.

But as we all know, David was himself a story-teller. For all I know, he may well be telling some poor hapless soul a preposterous story right now. So I've thought long and hard about the right story that I could tell today that might convey a bit of - I don't know - just simply, the David we all know and love. Whatever it is about him that could, in such a lovable way, and in such equal measures, delight, amuse, inspire, motivate, educate, frustrate, aggravate, excite, entertain, and just plain get me hysterical in so freakin' many ways.

When I think about all of the great adventures of my life, David was a companion on nearly every one. And as often as not, he was the inspiration for them. I think I came to measure my life, to a large extent, by those adventures - something that I think rubbed off from him. And there have been so many. Countless backpacking and river rafting trips, from California to Colorado and from Mexico to Canada and everything in between. But 1978 was the year of one our greatest adventures of all.

Proposition 13 had just passed, prompting a sudden one-month "panic" layoff of year-round employees for the month of August at the college where I worked. To me it was nothing more than a great opportunity! And when I told David about it, he was all ready with his latest plan for the most ambitious adventure yet. We'd drive as far north as is possible up the mainland coast of British Columbia with 2 kayaks strapped to the roof of the old Opal Kadette Rallye, (that's spelled with a "y-e", which we always pronounced "ral-yee" - I know this because I'd sold him the ral-yee after rebuilding the engine one winter in my kitchen). Once at the northern limit of the BC coastal roadways, we would put our kayaks in the water and spend the next 2 weeks paddling on the ocean. Never mind the fact that I'd never been in a kayak. David assured me it would be great, and easy, and totally cool, and he'd teach me everything I needed to know. David was good at that - (the “reassuring” part). So I hurriedly packed my gear and made the drive up to Eureka where he and Kath were living.

We had plenty of time, so David determined that we'd spend a couple of days, or whatever it took, on the local Humboldt County rivers to get me up to speed in handling a kayak. Beyond the simple basics of just paddling in a straight line without flipping over, David suggested that it might also be a good idea if I could learn to perform an Eskimo roll, just in case I did flip over upside down out on the ocean. I thought that seemed like a good idea too. So we worked on that. For about 3 days. My training involved a lot of deliberate flipping over in the kayak to hang upside down underwater while attempting the correct long sweeping stroke of the paddle while water runs up your nose - until you finally run out of air and elect to exit the kayak and find your way back to the surface in the more familiar maneuver known as swimming. By the third day, I wasn't flipping over quite so often anymore but I still hadn't managed a successful Eskimo roll, but Dave never lost patience. Finally, after many, many tries (it's NOT the most instinctive maneuver I'd ever seen) I managed my first successful roll, and Dave said, "Cool, we can leave tomorrow".

So we did leave the next day, probably at a typically "Dave", bright and early hour of maybe 5 or 6 pm. We weren't in a huge hurry to get up north, so we took a couple of days driving up there. David wanted to drive through the Columbia River Gorge and then through Mt. Rainier National Park, which was fine with me too.
We camped, illegally of course, somewhere within Rainier Park, and I enjoyed, as I always have on such trips, David's great explanations of the geology of the area, and the numerous glaciers we looked at. I also got my first preview of an aspect of our adventure that was to become an unanticipated but all too-often repeated feature of the trip - close encounters of the law enforcement kind.

It started in Rainier, with our first traffic stop by a law enforcement Ranger. He thought we were driving too fast. Well, we had decided to quit messing around and get up to Vancouver, but the little "speed" issue soon paled in the shadow of the fact that David didn't happen to have his driver's license. In fact, he didn't actually have much of any legal identification at all. I'm not even sure he had his wallet, but that isn't to say he didn't have a pocket full of whatever cash he needed for the trip - the important stuff. My memory of it isn't perfectly clear, but I do recall going through the glove compartment and searching the trash on the floor looking for anything that might at least suggest he was who he said he was. An old phone bill perhaps - anything. David was as earnest and committed as he always was in explaining to the officer the silliness of such things as paperwork, and I.D and such, but the officer remained unconvinced. And I amused myself photographing wildflowers for the hour or so it took for the officer to make numerous radio calls and continue the argument with David. Dave did get a smile out of him however, when he hollered to me to capture the moment on film, and then snapped his hands behind his back to look like he was handcuffed and struggling! And I got the photo.

Remarkably we were able to cruise across the border into Canada without a hitch, only to find ourselves the next day once again at the side of the road in the middle of Vancouver - this time with a much more surly and humorless Canadian Mountie. He was incredulous to the point of hostility at David's sincere explanation of his philosophy, and we lost at least another hour of our time to the requisite radio calls and ID fact checking, while the officer intimated that we COULD be subject to arrest. (What you mean, "WE" Kimosabe? – I had MY I.D!) I had to drive the car after that particular little chat.

A day or so spent staying at our friend Darryl's house in Vancouver and stocking up on supplies, ocean charts and maps, and we were finally off on the final leg of the long drive - a journey that included numerous ferry rides over the many fiords that interrupt the coast highway north of Vancouver. Late that day and many miles north of Vancouver, we had one last ferry to catch ahead of us. We were pressed to make it there in time to catch the last ferry run of the day that would put us on the final stretch of road that ended where our kayaking would begin. We were getting pretty pumped. And we were driving fast - on a nearly deserted road. And we went flying past yet another ever-vigilant Royal Mountie. I think at that point Dave and I both looked at each other and said the same bad word simultaneously. I may also have had some constructive comments about the relative merits of sticking to one's abstract principles versus the expediency of just carrying a simple little thing like a driver's license. But it would have been a short chat, because the Mountie was walking up to David's door. Sooooo - same story - same discussion of philosophy - same unreceptive attitude - different day. But somehow we made the ferry anyway - JUST in the nick of time. Mostly because the Mountie turned around and went the other way after he was done shaking his head over David, and we went back to driving like a bat outta hell.

We actually started kayaking the next morning, which was a refreshing switch from the more familiar starting times of most of our backpacking trips that so frequently began after nightfall.

And a glorious trip it was - incredible weather, scenery, campsites and a truly exhilarating sense of exploration and adventure. We had only the loosest idea of a route, another fantastic David trademark, and after a day or so, when I finally learned how to stop paddling in uncontrollable circles and could keep up with David, we became “Masters of the Sea”. In fact, we began to refer to one another by self-appointed “Eskimo” names. David became "Nanook", and he took to calling me "Otek". Where he got that one, I'll never know, but it sounded good at the time, and I nearly laughed myself out of my kayak the first time he used it. But I'm only relating this little bit of our absurdity because it helps to set up the final little part of this tale that has to be told.

We were a good week or more into our trip and we had covered quite a few miles, spending days paddling and exploring, camping most often on small islands, searching for sources of fresh water, snorkeling, gathering oysters, eating fish, having as much fun as I've ever had, growing ever more comfortable and happy doing exactly what we were doing, and getting more ridiculously silly all the while as Nanook and Otek.

One morning we awoke, as we often did, to find that the low tide had left us and our kayaks high on a rock shelf, now 12 or 13 feet above the water. Actually, in this case, I alone awoke, as David's fondness for sleeping-in was legendary. Our camping site was entirely exposed and out in the open on flat, solid rock without trees or shrubbery or any sort of sheltering foliage or structure of any kind. The weather was so perfect we didn't need any shelter, and as we were located out on the tip of a point protruding from the mainland, we had a terrific view of the surrounding water and nearby small islands. Familiar with David's penchant for sleeping in, I decided to suit up in my wetsuit and snorkeling gear to have a look around along the submerged vertical wall of rock at the ocean's edge of our campsite.

I got in the water and started exploring, making dives down to maybe 15 or 20 feet and discovering an entire wall covered with the first feather duster worms I'd ever seen. They're kind of fun to play with as they intstantly withdraw into their tubes when disturbed. You can even write or draw designs in them by making large movements with your hand over them. I also noticed a few fish that were decent candidates for breakfast, so I finned my way back to the ledge at the water's edge of our campsite, thinking about going to get my spear gun. I noticed David, now just awake and propped leisurely on one elbow, still in his sleeping bag and gazing out over the water. I probably hollered, "Hey, Nanook! How 'bout doing your ol' pal Otek a favor and bring me my spear gun over there so I don't have to get out and take my fins off. There might be a fish breakfast in it for ya!"

So, Dave, helpful guy that he was, climbed slowly out of his sleeping bag, stark naked, and sauntered over to get the spear gun out of my kayak. As he did, I turned to look away out over the water just in time to see a large beautiful yacht just coming into view from around the back side of a small nearby island. It was maybe a hundred yards away, and out on the deck and clearly visible at that distance were several obviously great looking young women - in bikinis, no less! And they were staring straight over at us. They were "INLET BABES" - precisely what Nanook and Otek had been fantasizing about being "on a quest for" for over a week now! (Yeah, yeah, I know, both Nanook and Otek were “attached”, but hey, even married Eskimo's can pretend!)

I turned back to check on David, amused at the thought that he was out walking around naked, and wanting to catch his reaction. However, not only had he NOT looked up yet to discover that he had an audience, he had found my spear gun and was bringing it slowly to me. But rather than simply walking over to hand me the gun, he was solidly in the grip of a classic moment of totally absurd David silliness.

Maybe it was having a spear gun in his hands - I couldn't say for sure - but he was coming towards me in a ridiculous, slow motion pantomime of something like a super hero comic book character, all hunkered down in a low, knees-bent, exaggerated long-striding, muscle-flexing, arm-pumping swinging of the spear gun out in front of him, and of course, the best part - still stark-ass naked. You don't often get such a great opportunity dumped in your lap with such a merciless teaser as David, so I just kept my mouth shut and let him bring it! He never looked up until he was nearly to me, when I simply gestured with a head nod over my shoulder to get him to look up to see his undoubtedly amused female audience on the yacht. And I don't think I ever again saw a faster shrinking of a grown man into a tiny little ball of nakedness. Nor have I ever laughed any harder than I did at that moment.

Clearly there's some stuff in this story about commitment, principles, passion, love, adventure, exploration, humor, absurdity. But those things, and much more, are in all of our David stories. I don't think this one even needs a real summary. It's just David. And I love the guy.