Pete Lavigne

The last time I saw Pete was over breakfast at a Perkins Restaurant in Fort Collins. He drove into the parking lot with his Honda Prius, grumbling something about how we could’ve met someplace more local rather than the kitschy Denny’s-like experience I’d been angling for. Together we shuffled into a booth on the south side; Casey was with us and they both ordered the works. When the food came Pete complained that the crystal materials on top of his muffin were too sweet and so he promptly began to scrape and scatter them onto his plate. I laughed at the metaphor. It was clear to me by now that underneath his gruff exterior Pete was a prickly but undeniably sweet man with a generous heart. He handed me a stack of CDs with sounds from the Amazon and the Pantanal. “Just give these back to me whenever you get a chance.” Across the table we talked much about his wife and daughter, whom he loved deeply; Pete seemed determine to impress upon Casey and me that parenthood was a pretty amazing experience and one worth fighting for.

I’d spent a month with Pete in Brazil on a Fulbright in 2007, the kind of intensive experience that creates either instant friends or split second enemies. Both from Colorado, Pete and I met on a plane flying toward Austin, Texas en route to the Fulbright orientation. He sat behind me; together we experienced the joys of nearby anxious triplet toddlers, seat gripping turbulence, and an unexpected stop in rural Texas for more fuel. His comments in response to these delays and debacles would mark him as the acerbic, knowledgeable counter to my upbeat, naive persona.

Brazil was wonderful – intense, colorful, and real. Rio and Sao Paolo and Belem were fabulous, but the highlight of the trip was a night trip I took with Pete and a local guide; we went fishing for piranhas in a wooden boat just outside of Manaus in the Amazon. Never caught one of the red bellied piranhas, but the stars on the night’s warm black canvas humbled and silenced us both. It is the quiet times when we bond most with friends and loved ones, the times when nothing and everything is said. “This is the real Amazon”, Pete would later summarize for me, as we stepped out of the rickety boat onto solid ground. That experience is now permanently seared onto my retina.

I spoke with Pete on the phone several times after I’d heard of his unexpected accident and diagnosis. I’d written a grant to bring him to campus and had excitedly told my resource management students much about his love of rivers and all things wild. In our conversation, he was concerned most about meeting his commitment to come speak, and I told him that I’d already taken this responsibility off his plate.

He then revealed to me his dream about a raven and told me he’d believed he’d led a very good and rich life. He was so self-assured and deliberate with his words. I realized that all along, Pete had been merely masquerading as a pessimist. His prognosis for recovery was good, he reassured me, and so we said our good-byes and sent our regards to the families.

Pete Lavigne died on Sunday at 11.39pm just as I was drifting off to sleep worrying about this and that – a couple of extra pounds, a minor slight from a friend, an expensive but mandatory house project. He passed away of cancer at the youthful age of 50-something. We lament this loss, for us and for the rivers of this world.