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Tribute to Max

      I've been away from the site over the past month due to a pressing deadline I was facing down in my work. I should have put this out before now, but have been at a loss for words. On May 19th I received an email from Hepsy that our mutual friend Max had passed away. Being wrapped up in my own little world, this came as a great shock to me. I knew she hadn't said much over the previous weeks, but then again I hadn't either, I just assumed she didn't have the time like myself.     

 I am at a disadvantage, in that I have so little information about her. Were it not for Hepsy, I wouldn't have known why the brilliant emails and comments had stopped, and I might have always wondered. I have so little information about max that I can't give you a proper eulogy, but I will tell you how I came to know her as a friend in the next few paragraphs.    

  The first comment of hers that I read was in response to my own. I had just gotten into an intense debate with a certain Left of Center Top User on this site who had played the race card in a debate on Welfare State Policy. She stood up and said that "It's easy to play any kind of card that's stuffed up someone's sleeve. The challenge is in playing the Constitution straight-up. Liberty means responsibility. That's why most people dread it and find excuses to avoid it." A person after my own heart, plus she was willing to stand up for me; I sent her a Friend Request to express my gratitude and didn't give her much thought after that.    

  That same Top User had gotten me rather angry with that comment, so I made it my purpose on the site to go after every inaccuracy and flawed premise that came from their Keyboard. During another exchange on polygamy, my sense of humor got the best of me and I accidentally broke the ice and started joking around with the enemy. Max then foed me for turning an article into a personal chat room. Not quite understanding her reasons. I sent her a message explaining that it was 2 AM and we were just letting off some steam. She accused me of chasing booty online and said she was justified in her decision. I replied by saying there were logistical difficulties in that, considering this person was on the East Coast; plus I was offended that she seemed so judgmental. I then explained that I'm the most boring person she could have hoped to meet, certainly not the sort that chases "booty" online. At some point, she realized I was telling the truth, she just didn't tell me. I must have made a dozen emails along the lines of" Who the hell are you to say this?". Eventually she broke down and told me that she was messing with my head, but she had all kinds of fun watching me fume in the mean time; we became friends after I realized what she had done.  

    She told me she had been watching my posts and that I didn't make sense to her, and as she told me continuously" My world must make sense". I guess she wanted to know what made me tick, she asked me a never ending barrage of probing questions ranging from my religious standpoint to my reasoning on the Constitution and why I fight. We spent hours on end critiquing one another on ideas, theories and beliefs; I stayed up several nights into the wee hours, just talking about ideas. Eventually I told her what she wanted to know about my experiences and how they shaped my opinion: I told her about how my family's fight with the healthcare system and my father's fight with cancer.    

  In hindsight I regret that, even though I just gave her what she wanted: the motivating reason of why I had developed into an ideologue. Little did I know, my story was eerily similar to hers, only she was living it; she herself had Hodgkin's Lymphoma. It turns out that behind the veil of humor and secrecy, there was a 20ish young girl who was trying to understand the world with what little time she had left. I reminded her of what she was trying to escape, for that I'm sorry. She had told me nothing about her circumstances, and we only spoke one more time after I told her my story.  The following is an excerpt of the email Hepsy sent me when I inquired more about her after her passing:  

 "Max was her name, Maxine. Her mother was a neighbor of a friend in California. I would sometimes see her when visiting my friend. Max knew for some time she wouldn't grow old. She didn't tell me what she talked about with either you or Ironhead. She only told me that she liked the way your brains worked.... Max wanted to know everything. She said that the things she needed to know weren't offered curriculum. She went to University of Guam, where she could experience a different culture if she didn't learn what she wanted. She said she quit because school wasted too much time. (But I think she quit because she was getting just too weak.) She was quite the pragmatist. LOL! She once said that teachers were so slow they couldn't inspire a rodent.Her family came from Tajikistan about twenty years ago. I met Max, her mother and sister 5-6 years ago. Her mother, Gala, kept things close to her chest, so much of what I know is from my friend, some Max told me. Her father, older brothers and sister were killed because they were Jewish. Max saw one brother die. Max, her infant sister and mother were taken in by neighbors, hidden and found asylum here. Max said the only thing she remembered from her life before coming here was her brother dying, the crack in the wall she watched through, and her mother's skirt wrapped around her. I would guess she may have been 2-3 at the time, I don't know her age for sure, young-mid-twenties probably.     

 I don't know where all the family lived before they settled as my friend's neighbor. Max's mother worried about her, said Max didn't care about having friends, and was always off in her own world. I saw Max as just too smart, and bored with most people. Her whole face would sparkle when a topic enthused her. From the time I first met her, she was determined to understand what makes people do things, always asking then really thinking the answers. She said that if the mind of a violent man was understood, who could slaughter a human, maybe those acts could be prevented.    Max inspired me, too."     

 She had no illusions about man's goodness or perfectibility; she had experienced evil personally. She devoted her extremely finite time to understanding it in the hopes of defeating it. She understood there was a group of people who enabled evil, albeit inadvertently, and understood they needed to be opposed. If someone told me I had only a little bit of time left to live, I can't honestly tell you how I would try to spend that time, but she spent it trying to understand the world and the injustice that envelops it. To better understand the world, she came here, and spent time with us.   

   I thank her for her time, something she shared when she had little to spare, she helped to change my outlook on life. I am honored that though she knew she wasn't long for this world, she wanted to spend that time with you and me. Thank You. http://www.politics.com/video/k-OlqERixVE/tribute-to-max--if-today-was-your-last-day/