i was a friend of peter’s when i was a boy, but we hadn’t spoken since i graduated from high school. my father called me yesterday and told me he had died.

i never knew the creative, confident peter you describe here, and reading your blog makes me deeply regret having fallen out of touch with him. it sounds like he grew into an impressive person and lived an unapologetic life.

the peter i knew was a very smart boy. i remember his mercurial sense of humor: impish one moment and black the next. once, he drew a picture of a slice of pizza and labeled it “your face,” then made an accompanying drawing of my face, subtitled “a slice of pepperoni pizza.” yeah, i had acne. that was peter.

we went to every comic book convention together, and he and his dad got me an autographed copy of geoff darrow’s “hard boiled” once, which became one of my most prized posessions.

that’s about all i remember about peter. i didn’t mean to ramble. his father is a wonderful man, and i hope that peter’s family is able to get through this okay. this is all really a terrible shame.

thanks for giving peter such a good sendoff. it makes me feel much better to know he refused to live a quiet life.

Peter was clean from herion when I met him. We were together for a few weeks and then he started using herion again. I am clean and sober so I nagged him, of course, to stop using. We lost touch after he called me on July 30th to let me know he was going to rehab. He called me again on Sept. 8th at 8:30 am and left a message. “I just flew in from jail and boy are my arms tired.” Of course I felt sheepish for calling him back but I did…and he didn’t pick up. He never called me back, (for reasons now obvious.) I just heard about it today. Never once did I regret getting so close to him and I still don’t. He’s one of the most endearing people I’ve ever met. Like you said, his wit, charm, and intelligence were his redeeming qualities…and they were more than redeeming. Hope he’s feeling better now.