Tom and Dottie were the best hosts ...

I cannot improve on the lovely and thoughtful comments left here by my ex-wife and lifelong best friend, Lynda. As Lynda said, we were Tom and Dottie's neighbors for many years and I was the grateful recipient of Tom's hospitality on many occasions. Although I only saw Tom once or twice a year, every time I arrived at his door he made me feel like only minutes had passed since our last meeting. Tom had a good wine cellar and he was quick to break out the good stuff, even for me who he saw so infrequently. Tom had such an intense fascination with geology, earth sciences and earthquakes and when I talked to him I couldn't help being fascinated too. I remember times, sitting with Tom, drinking his booze, and talking earthquakes into the wee smalls - what causes them, when is the next one coming, what public policy issues are implicated by the certainty of another "big one," and on and on, each idea feeding into the next. All the time, Tom talking to me as if I, who can't tell a dirt clod from El Capitan, was a peer who could understand it all perfectly. And you know, when you talked to Tom, you really did understand it all.

God, I 'm gonna miss him.