... a man you don’t meet every day
Marc David Richard Rigby
July 27, 1969 – January 21, 2011
Obituary | Tributes | Service of Celebration | Photo Gallery | Marc's Xmas Baskets
Michael's Remarks (Brother)
My brother and I were two very different people. I think it had something to do with when we were born. He was born 7 days after man landed on the moon for the first time. I was born on the day that Saturday Night Live aired for the first time, I think that explains a lot... very different. Like all brothers we didn’t always see eye to eye, in fact there were times when we were growing up that we downright hated each other, but I always looked up to him and respected him because in a lot of ways, it was him that made me what I am today.
He is responsible for my love of music. On a cold day in 1980, I was 5 years old, and Marc had convinced I don’t remember who, to take us into downtown Toronto to Sam The Record Man on Yonge St. After an hour or so wandering around this huge store, with my brother’s help, I used my allowance to purchase the first record I ever bought. I was 5 at the time, did I buy Raffi? or Sharon, Lois & Bram? Or the Muppets? No, the first album I ever bought under the tutelage of my dear brother, was Road to Ruin by The Ramones. And so began my long love of music. He is still the only person I’ve ever met who loves it more.
He is responsible for my love of literature, especially that of the comic book variety. Around the same time as the record store, we used to spend significant amounts of time in Bath Ontario, visiting our grandparents during the summers. Nana and Granddad used to give us a little bit of money to go the one and only convenience stare in Bath to buy a little bit of candy. One fateful day, we walked down to the store and while I was deciding what candy I wanted Marc walked up to me and handed me a comic book, and said "you need to buy this instead of candy, I promise you’ll love it!" I believed him and spent my money on the comic instead. I was still 5 at the time. Did I buy Mickey Mouse? Did I buy Richie Rich? Did I even buy Superman or Spider-Man? No, the first comic I ever bought under the tutelage of my dear brother was Ghost Rider #81, the issue by the way in which the original Ghost Rider is exorcised from Johnny Blaze; Johnny Blaze is killed by a death cult and the first run of the series ended. And people wonder why I have mild sociopathic tendencies. But I still love comics till this day, I even owned a comic shop for a while. And my love of comics inspired my love of reading and learning as a whole.
There were many other of my character traits that my brother is responsible for. My more than slightly skewed sense of humour and the strong belief that the only true humour comes at the misfortune of others, his fault. My love of and ability to retain encyclopedic amounts of completely useless and trivial information, from movie quotes, to song lyrics, to bizarre and ridiculous facts of all shapes and sizes, his fault. My strange and sometimes contradicting political view, his fault. My fundimental belief that no matter how wrong I am or how stupid and juvenile my behavior, that I’m always right, his fault. And so many more things that I could go on for ever and ever. But what it basically comes down to, is that love me, or hate me, most of me is his fault.
I’d like to end with a quote written by one of our mutually favorite authors, Neil Gaiman. Neil started his career writing a comic book called The Sandman. It was about a family called the Endless, who embodied all of the aspects of human existence, Destiny, Destruction, Dream, Desire, Despair, Delirium (who used to be Delight before she went crazy) and Death. Because of this series, Marc and I both choose to believe that Death is not a light at the end of a tunnel, or a Grim Reaper in a big black cloak, but a small, cute little goth girl, with an ankh tattoo and a penchant for hats and umbrellas. This quote is directly from Death herself:
"When the first living thing came into existence, I was there waiting. When the last living thing dies, my job will be finished. I’ll put up the chairs on the tables, turn out the lights, and lock the universe behind me as I leave. When I come to collect them, people often ask me why it was so short or what took me so long, and this is what I tell them. You got the same amount of time as all living things in this universe, though to some it seems unexplainably short and to others exhaustively long. You got what everybody gets... you got a lifetime. So I hope you lived.
My brother lived. Despite all the bad hands he was dealt, he still forced himself to live as few ever get to. He lived on his terms. He never compromised. I hope you all follow his example and live, too.