I've included below the text of my reflections of Patrick from the Berlin memorial service. - Ryan Wirtz
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Over one month has passed since Patrick’s Berlin community learned of his death and the people close to him here have gathered—and continue to gather— in a variety of capacities to reflect on him.
On February 15, we held a celebration of Patrick’s life at the Stanford Center in Berlin. Beyond that, however, we have seen a constant conversation about Patrick on this side of the Atlantic because his life meant so much to so many. We’ve mourned him in our city’s smoky cafes and tea houses, at brunches and dinners, in universities and workplaces and discos, and privately, in reflection, in our cars, subways, parks and living rooms.
We want all of you in the U.S. to know that Patrick’s legacy in Berlin continues; it is alive as the tree that will be planted here in his memory. On the ground in Berlin, among those who knew him, his presence is as palpable as his absence, in how much people miss him and how much he meant. And today, I want to reflect on my Patrick story with you all, as one of the many voices that Patrick has changed.
I want reflect on the reasons why he came to Berlin, why he lived his life deliberately in the spirit of what his friends and I called “The Essential Patrick”, and to capture and celebrate his legacy.
Patrick Wood’s incomparable time with us touched us profoundly. He touched us long before the tragedy of his passing, a remarkable event for all of us that will leave many questions unanswered and many hearts crying.
He touched us not because we have lost his love of humanity and its questions -- but because he dared to ask them at all.
Patrick engaged with his world and sought to understand it, and press back against it at its most fundamental levels. He had come to find in his heart the answers to questions for which there were no words, only feelings, and endeavored to find for himself an understanding of the earth in a way that was uniquely his, an insight that he imagined and articulated with his own distinctive voice.
This is what I will miss most about my friend Patrick; yet this will be to me his most enduring honor.
Patrick and I knew each other casually at Stanford, but grew close together during the spring 2004 quarter here at Stanford in Berlin. I remember the dinner that marked the beginning of the term, when he was hobbling around the table in crutches.
It reminded me how Patrick could be painfully, yet endearingly, clumsy and disorganized – not because his exceptional gifts ever failed him but because he was absorbed in a world of ideas and music (and yes, even gossip and banter) that distracted him from the minor details. He was keenly aware of this, though, and he celebrated it.
Patrick didn’t do details unless he had to, and on his first of his many nights in Berlin, when he set out to explore the legends of the city’s nightlife at Kino International, he missed the stairs and dramatically and ungracefully fell. And thus, at the start of the term, he defended his perceived lack of grace and glamour, charmingly defensive and sensitive. That was the essential Patrick.
Patrick came to Berlin to learn lessons that he could only find here. He learned them well and in the two years we were together in this city, the arc of his amazing grace beautifully illuminated himself and those around him.
In Berlin, Patrick came to understand and embrace who he was, but he cared more about what he could and would become. This element of essential Patrick is evident in a monologue from one of his favorite films, "All About My Mother", when the feisty drag queen Agrado proclaimed, “A person is more authentic the more he looks like what he has dreamed for himself to be.”
In Berlin, Patrick was able to become the young man he dreamed of becoming. He found answers to questions that could be lost in the lights of the city and the serenity of Germany’s countryside. He could laugh at the absurdity of it all.
Patrick and I would talk about the world’s big issues and the irrelevant. We would joke about mathematics, about love, about Germany and the Germans, about art and music and literature. We would question together politics and the value of the ironic hipster scene, and we would discuss strategy to transform our dreams and ambitions into reality.
Last summer, when we had graduated, we explored Munich together and met at the university where the S.S. captured the White Rose student group in 1944. Their humanist and intellectual approach to resisting the Third Reich particularly inspired Patrick because he was a thinker and identified in those who could think with him.
Patrick could relate to this more than he could any politician. He didn't care for wars or occupation, and he didn’t care much for most political issues; instead, everything that he found fascinating about Germany either died long before 1933 or was a product of the 21st century.
However, he found a sort of purity in being lost in thoughts and ideas and therefore embraced the White Rose for doing what he thought was the same. He came to appreciate the political questions in the way that he cared about the world and cared about humanity and where it was going.
He followed the world because he was of the world, and read voraciously to understand its complexity. In his own words, his insights focused less on discussions about the balance of power and more on balancing equality. And in Berlin, Patrick saw himself as an expatriate who wanted to break stereotypes and counter the negative attitude towards Americans that he saw pervading his German friends, colleagues, and society. But he did it all so subtly and gently. That was the essential Patrick.
After finishing at the University and walking around the English Garden, Munich’s central park, we bought some blueberries at a kiosk and found a patch of grass along a stream in the garden. We reclined together. Patrick asked me to open my laptop and bring him a German symphony; I chose Beethoven.
Under our slice of Bavarian heaven, we reclined on the grass under the cloudless sky, blue as robin's eggshells, and talked for hours as the sun set. We even ventured to consider our own response if we were approached by Hans Scholl to join the White Rose. In true Pat fashion, he said that if he were approached by any German guy as attractive as Hans, he would have done whatever he had asked. Patrick would often reference that day as one of the most special of our time together and I am comforted that he knew how much he was cherished.
Patrick was a serious student who was growing into a gentle man, with a grin and goofy laugh that brightened the world around him. He solved puzzles and proofs, created music like a star and amazed everyone with his brilliance. Yet, he did it all so quietly, without ever wanting recognition, without ever wanting to admit to himself how spectacular the essential Patrick could be.
He was becoming the great man we all knew he would become and was finding peace with himself to accept that he would do things differently. That would lay the foundation and his big work had only just begun.
There was in Patrick the most amazing promise for things to come; in Berlin, he found a place where he could realize it all. He embraced the city and the city embraced him. In this environment, he flourished. By his own admission, Patrick had some of his happiest days here, and, in fact, some of his happiest nights.
But Patrick was in pain and his soul fell burdened under the weight of his illness and the struggle of his own emotions—emotions that, like so many aspects of his life, were superhuman. But his struggle was superhuman also and ultimately defeated him.
Patrick was a young person who could not continue to fight, despite his gifts; who could not continue to cry, despite the joy he brought to his world; and could not continue to live, despite his energy and passion.
He left the world just as he lived in it—deliberately, not impulsively, and after what he felt was a rational, calm introspection. We have no choice now but to accept the fact that he felt the time had come, but I also take comfort in knowing that he left us painlessly and that he also felt that he would finally find peace.
Patrick knew he was not alone when he was alive. He knew that legions of people would reach out to him and he communicated that acceptance in his own Patrick ways. He leaves behind many people who loved him and many communities that will mourn his loss.
I had dared to dream of a Patrick who would grow old with his friends, whose wrinkled face would betray a lifetime of those laughs and smiles that we would share together and those laughs and smiles that only he could bring. But Patrick had every gift a man could want except more tomorrows than yesterdays. And we will never forget him.
This is what I will miss most about my friend Patrick; yet this will be to me his most enduring honor.
Patrick and I knew each other casually at Stanford, but grew close together during the spring 2004 quarter here at Stanford in Berlin. I remember the dinner that marked the beginning of the term, when he was hobbling around the table in crutches.
It reminded me how Patrick could be painfully, yet endearingly, clumsy and disorganized – not because his exceptional gifts ever failed him but because he was absorbed in a world of ideas and music (and yes, even gossip and banter) that distracted him from the minor details. He was keenly aware of this, though, and he celebrated it.
Patrick didn’t do details unless he had to, and on his first of his many nights in Berlin, when he set out to explore the legends of the city’s nightlife at Kino International, he missed the stairs and dramatically and ungracefully fell. And thus, at the start of the term, he defended his perceived lack of grace and glamour, charmingly defensive and sensitive. That was the essential Patrick.
Patrick came to Berlin to learn lessons that he could only find here. He learned them well and in the two years we were together in this city, the arc of his amazing grace beautifully illuminated himself and those around him.
In Berlin, Patrick came to understand and embrace who he was, but he cared more about what he could and would become. This element of essential Patrick is evident in a monologue from one of his favorite films, "All About My Mother", when the feisty drag queen Agrado proclaimed, “A person is more authentic the more he looks like what he has dreamed for himself to be.”
In Berlin, Patrick was able to become the young man he dreamed of becoming. He found answers to questions that could be lost in the lights of the city and the serenity of Germany’s countryside. He could laugh at the absurdity of it all.
Patrick and I would talk about the world’s big issues and the irrelevant. We would joke about mathematics, about love, about Germany and the Germans, about art and music and literature. We would question together politics and the value of the ironic hipster scene, and we would discuss strategy to transform our dreams and ambitions into reality.
Last summer, when we had graduated, we explored Munich together and met at the university where the S.S. captured the White Rose student group in 1944. Their humanist and intellectual approach to resisting the Third Reich particularly inspired Patrick because he was a thinker and identified in those who could think with him.
Patrick could relate to this more than he could any politician. He didn't care for wars or occupation, and he didn’t care much for most political issues; instead, everything that he found fascinating about Germany either died long before 1933 or was a product of the 21st century.
However, he found a sort of purity in being lost in thoughts and ideas and therefore embraced the White Rose for doing what he thought was the same. He came to appreciate the political questions in the way that he cared about the world and cared about humanity and where it was going.
He followed the world because he was of the world, and read voraciously to understand its complexity. In his own words, his insights focused less on discussions about the balance of power and more on balancing equality. And in Berlin, Patrick saw himself as an expatriate who wanted to break stereotypes and counter the negative attitude towards Americans that he saw pervading his German friends, colleagues, and society. But he did it all so subtly and gently. That was the essential Patrick.
After finishing at the University and walking around the English Garden, Munich’s central park, we bought some blueberries at a kiosk and found a patch of grass along a stream in the garden. We reclined together. Patrick asked me to open my laptop and bring him a German symphony; I chose Beethoven.
Under our slice of Bavarian heaven, we reclined on the grass under the cloudless sky, blue as robin's eggshells, and talked for hours as the sun set. We even ventured to consider our own response if we were approached by Hans Scholl to join the White Rose. In true Pat fashion, he said that if he were approached by any German guy as attractive as Hans, he would have done whatever he had asked. Patrick would often reference that day as one of the most special of our time together and I am comforted that he knew how much he was cherished.
Patrick was a serious student who was growing into a gentle man, with a grin and goofy laugh that brightened the world around him. He solved puzzles and proofs, created music like a star and amazed everyone with his brilliance. Yet, he did it all so quietly, without ever wanting recognition, without ever wanting to admit to himself how spectacular the essential Patrick could be.
He was becoming the great man we all knew he would become and was finding peace with himself to accept that he would do things differently. That would lay the foundation and his big work had only just begun.
There was in Patrick the most amazing promise for things to come; in Berlin, he found a place where he could realize it all. He embraced the city and the city embraced him. In this environment, he flourished. By his own admission, Patrick had some of his happiest days here, and, in fact, some of his happiest nights.
But Patrick was in pain and his soul fell burdened under the weight of his illness and the struggle of his own emotions—emotions that, like so many aspects of his life, were superhuman. But his struggle was superhuman also and ultimately defeated him.
Patrick was a young person who could not continue to fight, despite his gifts; who could not continue to cry, despite the joy he brought to his world; and could not continue to live, despite his energy and passion.
He left the world just as he lived in it—deliberately, not impulsively, and after what he felt was a rational, calm introspection. We have no choice now but to accept the fact that he felt the time had come, but I also take comfort in knowing that he left us painlessly and that he also felt that he would finally find peace.
Patrick knew he was not alone when he was alive. He knew that legions of people would reach out to him and he communicated that acceptance in his own Patrick ways. He leaves behind many people who loved him and many communities that will mourn his loss.
I had dared to dream of a Patrick who would grow old with his friends, whose wrinkled face would betray a lifetime of those laughs and smiles that we would share together and those laughs and smiles that only he could bring. But Patrick had every gift a man could want except more tomorrows than yesterdays. And we will never forget him.
1 comment:
Ryan,
Thank you for taking the time to post your eulogy. It captures Pat so accurately, no no other friend could. You are so dear to us over and over again. Thank you for remembering the essential Patrick when you are crazy with work and saddened by seeing his empty apartment a block away from you every day. Thank you for helping me remember him so beautifully. I love you like a son.
Lisette
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