I woke up to this email today:
Dear [ lineatus ],
I'm Sasha Stortz, and William Stortz, realaskan, is my dad. You may have seen in the news that Sitka, AK, our home, has been hit by some bad landslides this week, and my dad is missing in one of them. They have recovered the two others who were in the slide and are hoping to find him tomorrow. I know how much the Dawn Chorus and all of DailyKos meant to my father, and would appreciate if you could some how share the news through there. We are not doing a lot of responding to messages, right now, we have been inundated, but knowing that there is positive energy being sent our way is holding us all up, and the DailyKos was a really good source of positivity, entertainment and community for my dad.
Thanks and take care,
Sasha
I hope navajo doesn't mind if I use her photo - it's so perfect. This was from a few years ago when realalaskan visited Bay Area Kossacks for a day of birding (as part of a trip to visit his daughter).
I'm so sorry to be the bearer of this news.
[ I originally kept his real last name out of the story because I wasn't sure if it was okay to include it. If you read any of the stories, it's pretty easy to figure out so I've added it back in. ]