John Koch
I can’t imagine anyone will read this, as it has been a year since Glen/Elena passed away, but a random Google search just recently let me know of their passing.
Let me start by stating that I only knew Elena as Glen, and our friendship only lasted for a few years, though they were formative years. I mean no disrespect, but I want to refer to them as Glen for the rest the of this posting, only because that’s who they were to me.
I first met Glen shortly after he moved to Cohasset, MA, when he answered a for sale ad for my three-speed bike prior to, I think, the seventh or eight grade? That’s my first memory. All of the other seem unconnected, but here they are.
His short story “I, Nobody,” which was undoubtedly a take on “I, Claudius,” but one of an existential turn. I grasped neither, for Glen was both far smarter and far more sophisticated and cultured than I, but it didn’t change the fact that the story impacted me so much that only a few years later (in a high school half across the country), I wrote a story called “Nobody”.
Some kind of a talent show (I can’t quite remember the context), in which Glen, John Kornet and I put together some kind of a spoken word/jazz story about Spot and Ralph (I think). I was Spot and Ralph was my dog. I have no idea what the story was about, nor who put it all together, but John and Glen played bass and alto sax. Looking back on that, it seems pretty Greenwich Village for some early 80s kids.
I remember a birthday card he made for me. It was shaped like a cloud and painted brownish-white. In black lettering, he write, “Someone suggested that I make your card in the shape of a heart.” On the inside he wrote, “I thought they said ‘fart”. Oh, well. Happy Birthday anyway!” Brilliant.
My final memory, and probably my last before I moved from Cohasset in the late summer of 1983, was venturing into the woods with my friends to experience a real-life Dungeons & Dragons adventure near his home on Forest Ave. I hat an amazing night.
Glen was brilliant, erudite, insightful, nuanced, funny, and the fact that I lost touch makes me sad. I am also sad that because I lost touch I was unable to offer any support to Elena, as I am not unfamiliar with people who have discovered that they belong to the trans community.
I hope somebody gets to read this and, just for a moment, remembers Glen/Elena was how special they were.
With sadness,
John Koch