From an old Rice University friend...

Keith, when Thad told me the horrible news it just didn't sink in, it just couldn't be true, it was too much like something I could picture Leslie telling me about with that rueful way of speaking, and then the capstone last remark. I'm still waiting for his one line summation of such a fate. What has struck me is how many of my memories are of the particulars of Leslie's mannerisms--he was incredibly distinctive in his ways of being in the world. I can hear his voice. I can see his hands, his smile, his jaunty walk, his jeans and belt and coat. I don't know. It is as if he is too real to be gone. I can't believe it. I think of the two of you at la Griglia and the delight at seeing you two there. The jousting, the jostling, the laughing laughing laughing. Yes, Leslie and I fought, many times. But I was counting on fighting with him many more times. He was a worthy opponent. I never understood why we drove each other nuts, what made us act like teenagers in a snit with each other. Yes, we often rubbed each other the wrong way. But that is just it--we got under each others skin and that is real and human and what I counted on. Where where has my madman gone? He was the smartest and the dumbest. God, he could jauntily walk right into it. And that was what I so loved about him--watching him coming toward me, drink in hand, ready to have an evening of to and fro, wry and ribald, his head full of big ideas, his heart full of conflict. The combination was potent, though he had a way of sneaking up on you as if he was just some guy, some regular guy out for laughs. He was anything but a regular guy. He was the most
complicated man I've ever known. I am devastated at this loss. I can't imagine what you, Keith, must feel except that it must be breathtaking to lose his side of the commentary. Your partner in crime. Oh what would he make of such a fate?

Marsha Recknagel