I’ve not written anything about the passing of Lactose the Intolerant, mostly because I don’t know what to say. I feel helpless.

Please pardon the breaking of character, but I never met Mr. Siddoway. And I’ve not had direct one-on-one communications with him. There have been email threads that included others, particularly Harvey, but he and I never communicated on a personal level. Yet, I feel as if I knew him, at least a little.

Part of that comes from the few communications here at IMAO, and part comes from reading his writings at Nuking Politics. Still, in those brief and quite indirect encounters, I thought, “Gosh, I’d like to meet this guy. He seems like a quality person.”

From his obituary, I think that’s borne out.

None of what I’ve written has alleviated that feeling of helplessness. But should it? It’s not about me and what I’m feeling. It’s about Mr. Jonathon David Siddoway and the family he leaves behind. This online family at IMAO isn’t feeling the grief his actual biological family or his church family is experiencing. They are the ones directly affected by his loss, and have a huge hole that will never be filled. But they have memories that will never be lost.

[If you have comments, please offer them on Harvey’s post.]