Todd next to his jet
My elder son, Todd Mitchell Brady, died unexpectedly in January2020 from medical complications with cancer. Beyond family connections, two identities mattered most to him: ex-football player at Ole Miss and accomplished pilot. He was a captain at America West, U.S. Air, Pegasus, and American Airlines. He was also a carrier qualified jet pilot in the U.S. Navy. He loved it. We loved him. R.I.P. dear son. Dr. Ivan Brady
Sad news. Inspired by his amazing book, Social Stratification in Polynesia, I was spending the summer in Hawaii researching possible dissertation topics and met him while I was at the Bishop museum. We had hamburgers for lunch while he helped me focus my plans for research on Tuvalu. We met several times thereafter and he agreed to anchor the ASAO special publications series I was editing with his scintillatingly smart and widely cited Historical Metaphors and Mythical Realities. One of the brightest and most original minds in the history of the discipline and a good friend, he will be missed, especially by those of us who tagged along for a lifetime and benefitted from his genius but did not always agree with him.
For a smart and informative “pre-mortem”review of the impact of some his earlier work on anthropology and history, see Michael Goldsmith’s “The Evolution of Marshall Sahlins” in Texts and Contexts, edited by Doug Munro and Brij V. Lal, University of Hawaii Press 2006: 76-86
Thinking about the recent passing of friends and staring down my upcoming birthday on April 13th, a list of my own personal vulnerabilities, aches, and stumbles pushed through the fog with taunting echoes of OLD AGE and the all too familiar question of how exactly time flies. The following words fell out of my reverie and assembled themselves on a page. There may be more but I haven’t seen (or dreamed) them yet.
DANGER ZONE
Brady’s eighty
Feeling weighty
Skull bulb’s dim
Motivation’s slim
Hair’s caught leaving
Heart’s still grieving
Wrinkles line up
Like ropes in a cup
Covid’s in the air
Insects do not care
Clock hands spinning
Like props on a plane
slicing through memories
On the flight to my brain
