Aqdas was the very first person Jessica ever saw, even before Karen or me, as he delivered her. It is particularly appropriate, therefore, that Jessi be the one to share this with his family and loved ones.

David Brooks wrote a book a decade or so ago, The Road to Character, in which he pointed out the differences between our résumé virtues and our eulogy virtues. He meant to show the too-great focus we tend to place upon our résumé selves, and not enough focus on our eulogy selves.

Aqdas’ résumé is impressive in multiple dimensions. Likely Karen and I would not have met Aqdas and Heather had both of them not been accomplished medical practitioners in our little town of Glide, Oregon, in the latter 1970s. His and Heather’s résumé selves did serve to open the opportunity for us to meet. But the focus here is not on Aqdas’ résumé, but, rather, on who he was.

What follows are some of my observations of Aqdas. See if they also ring familiar with you. 

Aqdas was as authentic an original thinker as any of us will ever be likely to encounter. It seems impossible to understand him without knowing how differently he thought about and approached virtually everything. He defined himself, rather than allowing others to define him, and he resisted judgment by others.

Aqdas and Heather always treated us as family. Their open door and open hearts were not just what Karen and I experienced, but what Jessica first came to learn as what love from others looks like.

Alia and Nadia have had the best of parents. Aqdas and Heather were devoted, focused, and very caring. The girls were always accepted, loved, and nurtured. It is no surprise that they have grown into the remarkable women and parents they are. Their stature in the world proves this point. It is such a blessing that Aqdas was able to spend time with his grandchildren, too.

Aqdas always had an eye open to travel and relocation. By the time we met Aqdas and Heather, they had already served in medical settings in the Northwest Territories, Australia, and California. He would later add Hawaii, Arizona, and Texas to that list, and likely I am missing some points along the way. He was the consummate voyager, or perhaps explorer is a better term.

Aqdas was a man of his own tastes. He saw the beauty in things, and in combinations of things, which perhaps only he could fully appreciate. From what he wore to how he danced to how he did virtually everything he did, he was his own man.

More than once, he got out beyond his skis. But I cannot recall him crying the blues over his mistakes. He tried to be a good man, in the most fundamental, loving, sense.

A dear friend of mine is an author, psychotherapist, and lecturer. Decades ago, he pointed out to me that when we are operating out of our highest developmental capacities, we are compassionately curious. Compassionately curious in large measure describes Aqdas. He had more than casual interest in everything, and in everyone. He was as much interested in discovering new things about guitars as he was about new medical techniques. To say he was a lifelong student is no overstatement. It is also fair to say that he was in perpetual Scan Mode for new people, places, and things.

Perhaps the most significant characteristic Aqdas maintained was his willingness to without hesitation take responsibility for others. It was not a matter of discussing the situation or weighing the pros and cons of taking responsibility. It was a matter of him reaching clarity in his heart, then acting on that clarity without reservation and without delay.

When our family was mired in the depths of financial and personal distress, it was he who offered help. I have no doubt he sought out those moments in your lives and did what he could to assuage your moments of discouragement in facing your trials. That is who Aqdas was.

Aqdas was interested in creativity in its various forms. He participated in two projects I invited him to join, and in each he delivered beautifully. One was his allowing me to record his voice speaking the Harvard Relaxation Response for a relaxation audio program. He also provided a recording of a perfect human heartbeat for that project. Another was providing a written passage for a little book on death and dying my mother and I were putting together in the aftermath of our losing my sister to cancer in the late 1980s. I asked Aqdas to contribute a passage about his beliefs concerning there being no continuing-on after we die. I will include it below, for it is particularly appropriate to understand and, especially now, appreciate that he was truly writing from his heart.

The older we get, the more valued and clear our relationships become. We may shape-shift in many ways and for many reasons over the years, but we also at last come to understand the true contributions our family and loved ones make to us. We are who they are, or were. Aqdas, thank you, and I miss you, my dear friend.

With my love,

Marty

Death As An End

By Aqdas S. Kuraishi, M.D.

Aqdas S. Kuraishi, M.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Family Practice, University of California, Irvine, wrote the following view of what death and life are to him:

"It is simpler, in a way, that there is neither a heaven nor a hell that awaits me. The good and evil in my actions and thoughts is not cryptic. And when I die, whether it would be sudden, or slow and well-anticipated, matters little. I will not worry about the long-term consequences of what I do. If I am happy today and don’t hurt anyone, then I have succeeded in living today. And if I fail on those two counts, I have failed.

Also, in death will come no fear or anxiety of what might have been, no remorse. I don’t see a physical going-on or a spiritual going-on after I stop breathing, but I see what I do and the things that I change with people that I know going on and continuing. In essence, they will be my immortality. For we don’t die; we stop breathing. If we die and no one remembers us, then nothing bears the scratch of where we touched it. And in that way, I guess I, also, try to escape my inevitable non-existence.

I’m also happy to know that death will never happen to me. I will not have to live through it. I will not see the faces of the people that mourn my death or friends that miss me. I will not have to miss my friends. I will not have to miss seeing the sunrise or feeling the ocean spray against my face, for I will be naught.

Somehow in not believing in afterlife, it gives me freedom to bend. It gives me the ability to judge my actions by simple standards, and not have to judge those qualities of those actions, which are beyond my comprehension.