Remembering Alex

Alex Chirelstein died suddenly last week. This was a person whose presence was felt even though his physical being was miles away. An avuncular, embracing, rat-a-tat-tat speaker of a man, I will miss him…we all will miss him…deeply.

His synthesis project for a class was brilliant.

He rendered a collage of Vygotsky’s life that brought together many elements from class and more than one of two from Alex’s imagination. There were layers upon layers embedded in this work and it was an example of fun and work at play all at the same moment. That’s the way it was with Alex. Though he was intensely serious, just underneath his passion for what he believed was a perspective that kept nudging his absolute devotion to whatever he was talking about in that moment. Seconds later, he could reverse his thoughts and argue the point from a totally different perspective, all the while with a twinkle in his eye, a twinkle that signaled his love for the engagement.

I barely knew Alex. And yet because of his “what you see is what you get” qualities, of what I knew, he let me know those parts well.

The vastness of this world has shrunken a bit because it (and we) lost this complicated, brilliant, new friend.

. . . .

From the Free Press, forwarded by Dr. Penny Bishop.

Published by

Charles Rathbone

Retired. Emeritus. UDL consultant, FIrst UU Racial Justice Committee, photographer, married, four children, five grandchildren. Embracing life, all of it. "Today is tomorrow's past."

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