Patrick Q. Hickey..

After spending the evening at PJ's and waving goodbye to Cynthia and our friends we drove down to Hollywood, CA to play the Knitting Factory (14th). As we left Pj's house I was checking my email via Tyler's iphone (which has been a blessing to have google maps on the road) when I received a troubling letter from my good friend Patrick's good friend from Cleveland, Adam. He mentioned Pat had been in a terrible bike accident and that I should give Adam a call.
Here I will take a break and tell ya'll about Patrick Hickey and what happened. I met Pat my freshman year while volunteering at Operation Nightwatch in Seattle one evening Winter quarter. He was hip, happenin' and had long curly hair. Dan Zimmer mentioned something about Pat playing bass which naturally sparked conversation between Pat and I on the way back to campus. Turns out he was the only person I have met who is equally as in love with Joan of Arc (band) and the whole Kinsellas crew. For those of you who don't know of JOA: they are and avant-rock indie band from Chicago...no one in the mainstream likes them. From this conversation Lt. John Dunbar was formed. We played our first show about a month later...Dunbar, the bass/guitar instrumental duo with James Earl Jones reading Hebrews became mildly famous on the SPU campus and was invited to play many events throughout the next year and a half. From playing in Dunbar Pat and I became good friends- so good that he along with some other homies enticed me to live on their dorm floor the following year. Spending most of my time (when not with the band) with Pat and our newfound friend Sean Hamilton, we had many crazy adventures together. We built bikes together, played music together and schemed together. Pat, feeling SPU wasn't the place for him moved back to Cleveland in the Spring to become a bike messenger (his dream). We in Seattle all waved sadly goodbye as he moved back to the brown town. Keeping in pretty good contact throughout the spring we were looking forward to a patrick visit in the fall (he did indeed wiggle himself into a bike messengering position). Amidst planning a Lt. John Dunbar reunion show, and perhaps another STP ride I received this email from his Cleveland friend, Adam. (oh there is so much more I could write about Pat and our two short years as friends, but I figure this will do for now..)
I preceded to call Adam while leaving PJ's house that morning (14th). Pat's bike accident was fatal. He had pasted away while in a coma (or something to that effect) friday night. It was a depressing and quiet seven hour car ride to Hollywood. I spent our gas and reststops calling friends from Seattle passing the news and morning together. It was (is) hard deal with all this while being on tour and busy or driving 99% of the time. It was nice to be with friends, friends who knew and loved Pat, but it was hard because we had a million things to do between then and that evening.