January 21, 1967 – August 16, 2024
Your birthday is soon, and I miss you. I have missed you every day since you died. And almost daily I have wondered why you never shared your middle name, Samantha — it really suits you. Such a small and inconsequential thing to find out after you’re gone, but it sticks with me for whatever reason.
You changed my life. Who the fuck gets a job from Reddit? It was so bizarre that I was worried it was a scam. But it wasn’t. Thank you for that, Tracy. You changed my life for the better.
You were, hands down, the funniest person I’ve ever had the honor of knowing. Many of your quips and stories live on in perpetuity in the work chat archives. Sometimes I remember something you said and go searching for it because reading it in “your” words, as it were, makes me feel like you are closer. It also usually makes me cry. You were so smart, so fucking tenacious, so genuinely generous. You were unapologetically you. You always encouraged me. You told me I could accomplish anything I put my mind to, an often hollow phrase, but I believed it coming from you because you never said anything you didn’t mean.
I’m glad you’re relieved of your suffering, both physical and mental. Nobody should ever have to feel that much pain, and my heart breaks that you did. I’m proud of you for making it so long, to 57 years old. I think you were in pain for that entire time. I’m proud of you for holding out, for trying. You were so fucking brave to live and die as you did, and I hope you finally feel free.
I’ll close with something I wrote a few days after you died:
In times of loss I always ask myself, what happens to the space that someone occupied when they are no longer there to fill it? And I still don’t know; there are probably a million answers to that question. Right now it really hurts and I miss her.
I'm tired, let's wash away 