Terry Garey

Gone now. She'd been ill for a long time, but for a long time before that she had been an ornament of Twin Cities, and before that Bay Area, fandom. Quiet, often motionless, but managing never to be inconspicuous, she was easy to talk with - and it was with, not to, because without ever being loud or pushy she was always responsive and involved in conversation. She was one of the people who gave the circles she belonged to their special flavor.

I am one of many,
many,
many,
many people who knew and loved Terry and felt a special connection to her.

I would see her around at Little Men's, around the Portable Bookstore, in The Other Change of Hobbit after that opened - she clerked there for a while, and I got to walk in one day and wish her happy Boxing Day, back when few people in this country knew what that was - the Magic Cellar, parties and meals and conventions. After she moved to Mpls, I was changing planes there once and contacted her beforehand, so she came down to the airport (this was before 9/11) and we had lunch.

I think the most special thing she did for me was to convince me to join Spinoff, which was one of the apas founded to continue the mixed-sex conversations of the original AWA after the men were asked to leave. Spinoff had a loose and random/goofy air to it, Firesign Theater and FKB, and I found it best to write for it late at night, when my mind was disconnected and could free associate. There was a bit of that to Terry too, but she was never undirected and always knew where she was going.