R.I.P. Bill
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. That one is definitely taken. The pace we’ve all agreed to, because of that bright yellow thing in the sky we circle around, seems certain. It’s a small collection of certain things these days. Sunrise in the east. Sunset in the west. Dark chocolate’s unyielding superiority to milk chocolate. And death.
Death took a bunch yesterday, will again today and will again tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. Bill Edmond crossed the mortal Rubicon in Davenport yesterday, and he’ll be sorely missed. A Wyoming-loving cowboy and Vietnam veteran, we crossed trails during his service as Davenport alderman from 2009 through 2015. Bill rode into local government service on a platform of straightforward principles of good government, low taxes and telling the truth as he knew it. Always ready to do his part, he'd saddle up a Public Works snowplow in the big storms, and never failed to show up for the annual clean-ups or bridge-paintings the Council took on.
He’ll be most fondly remembered for his ridiculously unironic Hawaiian shirts, aptitude for plain talk and remarkable ability to be friends with people he vociferously disagreed with. A gun-toting, flag-waiving, Ronald Reagan-worshipping conservative, it was wonderful to watch him and somewhere left of Marx Mayor Gluba go at it, but grow to be friends. We need more of that in government; passion with civility.
He enjoyed his baseball and would stop in to chat about his Rockies, my Cubs and any team I was coaching at the time. We had an annual bet of a dollar a game for the difference in wins of our MLB teams, and I’m going to miss the camaraderie of the wager. Of all the elected officials I’ve ever worked with, Bill would stop in the office, text or call the most. He was known to enjoy a cocktail, and would call me at home in the evening, and I’d honestly wonder if I was missing out on something with the non-cocktail lifestyle. I once confessed the Malin household had no guns, alcohol or tobacco within it, and Bill laughed heartedly, saying that sounded like the worst place, ever. He was my boss, and when he stopped being my boss, he was a friend.
That’s not quite true. He was one of the rare bosses who made themselves a friend. As one small example, I once expended three vacation days in a Davenport hospital losing eighteen pounds as a cascade of internal organs went haywire. There was a strict no visitors rule in place, as I city managed via Blackberry and hospital pj bottoms, looking a mess. Bill ignored the no visitors rule, and showed up to boost my spirits. I was always appreciative of that.
Life goes on because it does, but as the rain-swelled creek burbles outside the breakfast window, the passing of time seems not quite certain. I remember his smile and cowboy charm like yesterday, yesterday, yesterday. Friendship is not a force bound to the space-time continuum.
