Sunday, April 29, 2007

Late but not because Pastorio hasn't been on my mind

We were in Japan when Bob died. I'd taken notice of bonsai and food and local color, snippets of travel that I was going to share with him when we got back. Not to be.

In the folder I keep that's labeled food_recipes, the folder where I stash Usenet posts having to do with food, there are plenty of Pastorio posts. Bob's aren't the only posts there, mind, but his name does show up by far the most frequently.

I just did a search of =all= the stuff I have stashed in my folders for pieces that list Pastorio as "from" -- articles and e-mails by Bob that I've stashed away in my mail folders since late 2000.

242 matches found.

Zounds.

Some of those matches are just the fun links and photos he'd send off to undisclosed-recipients, some are posts from misc.writing, some to WIW-L, some to Magwrite. ... elsewhere. I stashed away stuff ranging from posts on Sacher Torte, to time wasters to Penguin movies and "how to write for kids," lemon curd and wise, philosophical stuff.

To call Pastorio a jack-of-all-trades is not really showing the breadth of his interests. To say the guy strung words together like an angel, doesn't capture the cadence. If he was miffed at you, you knew it. Those he wasn't miffed at would read his dancing, punching, bam-bam posts as he took you apart bit-by-bit and applaud the elegance and eloquence.

I miss him. I'll continue to miss him. I'll think of him when I see a bonsai or make (if I do say so myself) tasty empanadas filled with four different kinds of filling for a neighborhood gathering. I thought of him the other night when we were at a Zin tasting and the dessert buffet included mini molten chocolate cakes.

There'll be tasty things cooking wherever Pastorio wound up and wide-ranging discussions and a bit of music.

Heaven, I think. What other decision could St. Pete make? Mini molten chocolate cakes. Heaven.

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