for byler
It is good to be back in touch with all of you, albeit the reason is a tragic one. I am terribly saddened by the news of Byler’s death, and I know Ye Wa is devastated. We both liked him very much, and we remember the palpable joy and motivation he experienced as a participant in the summer’s field school in China. His joie de vivre energized the whole group. And now he is gone! It is quite unfathomable.
We have been racking our brains, Ye Wa in particular, as to what we could possibly have done to let the anticipation of next year’s field school carry Byler through his recent bout with depression. The sad answer is that, in all probability, no remedy of a merely moral sort could have helped him after he decided to stop taking his medicine, allowing his cruel disease to kill him. It is difficult to accept this, but we cannot do otherwise.
So we mourn Byler’s passing, cherish his memory, and send our sympathy to his family, who no doubt can use any amount of it in these trying days. Perhaps our efforts, symbolic though they are, to commemorate him at Yangguanzhai, where he was happy, will be of some comfort to them.
I have been thinking of all of you, and I hope you are doing well. Please stay in touch. I hope to see you all again before long.
With my best wishes,
Lothar von Falkenhausen