Bill Mortenson, aka Lizard Man, died Saturday June 12, 1999. He was in Phoenix, where his mother had brought him to the VA hospital, days after being rushed there from Miami, where he landed after being kicked off a boat he was helping to deliver. Not surprisingly, his rantings about the CIA were taken for the paranoid delusions of a drinker, rather than the cancer that was eating him alive, and would claim him shockingly soon. Because for Bill, ranting wasn't strange, just like Bill drinking wasn't strange.

The strange stuff was that Lizard Man, sounding like a nick name given to a man of questionable character, was rather the appellation given to him while he gathered information for his PhD thesis on, yes, lizards. He had come down here over 20 years ago to study the critters, and was probaby one of the foremost authorities on them around. He headed up pollution studies, flood control plans, and put together environmental impact studies for numerous building projects in the VI's. That is a bare sketch of his professional side. Because there were sides to Bill for everyone he met, and certainly facets still undiscovered. We thought we have forever to find out, and then learned that this was all the time with Bill we had. But who knew?

Who knew he'd been married four times either? Everyone that has a story to tell about Bill ends up with someone listening, someone who *knew* him saying, "Wow, I didn't know that!" I didn't know he had a trail down in the bush, where he and his son used to sit, trees marked with symbols to describe his findings. But I can easily picture that, and can walk down myself one day to see. I only found out what his real name was the day he drove me back and forth across Donkey Hill in a horrible truck I was using for a job. I was afraid to drive, so he did, though he barely knew me. It was hot and nasty out, and no one believed he'd even show up. But show up he did, sober, and only a few minutes late, telling me to relax. He cheerfully drove me around all day, reassuring me I wasn't a wuss for being afraid of driving that truck. After a few hours, Bill told me it was the most stupid job he'd ever heard of in his life, and that I should quit. When the day was done, I knew a lot more about him than before. Driving and talking... I quit the next day, with no regrets.

We heard he was sick by a phone call to Rick, at Bottoms Up, the marina bar. "Bone marrow cancer, four or five days to live." They were right. We have cried, and laughed as pictures taken of Bill over the years started coming in. These will be made into a collage by Peggy. One, showing Bill aboard his boat wearing only a big grin, will be graced with the infamous *blue dot* in an unusual attempt at decorum. Because after the service in the states, his family will send half his ashes down (prompting, natually, the observation that we'll be giving Bill "a half ash send-off"), to his island *family* here. We will talk some more, laugh and cry some more, and learn some more, while we raise our glasses to Lizard Man. His ashes will drift or fly, depending on the weather, out over the Lagoon where he lived on his boat.

Yesterday, Tim and I dinghied out in the rough waters of the entrance to the lagoon, to say our own goodbyes. Soaking wet, dinghy sliding in the choppy trough, we talked about how strange things are here, how life is different, and how Bill will become another of the stories told. On that more formal day, as formal as we get in shorts and t-shirts, we will say a unisoned fare well. And when we all come back ashore...there will still be lizards, everywhere.