In Memorium
PG Holyfield is dead.
This may not mean a lot to those outside the rareified atmosphere of modern geekdom. Perhaps, it won’t mean a lot to many within the realm of the geek either, but it means a lot to me.
PG Holyfield is dead and I am heartbroken.
Three weeks ago he was told his number was up. There was nothing anyone could do, the cancer was too advanced. Three weeks was all he had. Three weeks to take in the calamity that had struck him out of the blue. Three weeks to arrange his affairs as best he might for the future of his family. Three weeks to say goodbye to his wife and two young daughters. Three short, horribly unfair, weeks of time in which to live the rest of his life, and, as if an incommutable death sentence wasn’t bad enough, even that time would be largely overshadowed by the pain and debilitation brought on by the betrayal of his own body and the rapidly growing cancer.
PG Holyfield is dead and somehow the world keeps turning.
I learned it yesterday morning. He died in the night, hopefully close to his family.
When the news broke I felt a shock I haven’t experienced since the death of my father more than 30 years ago. Not that PG Holyfield was like a father to me; I never met the man in person. It was just that it happened so damned fast and to someone I expected to be around for a very long time to come.
PG Holyfield, for those who don’t know, was a podcaster and writer; creator of the wonderful Murder at Avedon, and numbered among the genuinely cutting edge “transmedia” artists of the digital age (along with J.C Hutchins, Tee Morris, and Scott Sigler).
He was amazingly generous. Murder at Avedon, is a full cast audio-book, given away for free to the world. I have been given hours of joy listening to PG narrate this story. It is funny, exciting, and thrilling all at once. His inventiveness is superb and I am aghast that his voice has been silenced so soon.
My discovery of modern audio drama grew directly out of my discovery of pod-casting and my introduction, very early on, to Murder at Avedon Hill.
As a nerd, I am grateful for the generous contribution he has made to my life. As a father, I hope his wife and children will find the strength to bear up against this tragedy. As a Christian, I hope he is now wrapped in the mercy of God, far from pain and harm.
To those who never new PG Holyfield, his legacy remains. Visit podiobooks.com and download murder at Avedon. Leave a donation as thanks for this freely given creative work. All proceeds go to his family and, right now, his family are in need.
PG Holyfield is dead.
I miss him already.
