Greg and I have tried here on Fedorable to give our insights on various challenges we have faced in developing Presskit’n and IvyLees. It’s in that spirit that I write this post, even though he’s not here to help me with it.
Greg died on Sunday, September 13th in a car accident while returning from ProgPower, a metal concert in Atlanta. He was 25.
Together, we had learned a lot of our start-up lessons the hard way. We had been slapped by the chicken-and-egg problem. We had several of the I-should-be-asleep-right-now rushes to fix last-minute bugs. We had major new features go virtually ignored. We had faced criticism, both fair and unfair. We had struggled to maintain a constant user base.
And, every time the going got tough, every time we failed, we shrugged our shoulders and continued on.
Then, out of nowhere, Greg died. Suddenly, scrambling late at night to find an elusive bug seemed like nothing. His death wasn’t nearly the same type of problem. I found myself unable to lift my shoulders, and unable to go on.
Initially I had wanted to write this post on the technical details of this event. I wanted to separate the emotional parts. But I can’t. It just doesn’t work that way.
Relationships between co-founders can range from a 9-to-5, just-the-business relationship to “Sure, I’ll get a blood test to see if my kidney’s good for a transplant” friends. Greg and I fell into the kidney category.
If a start-up has the foresight to prepare for something like this, they’ll usually do it in a very details-oriented way. There will be preparations made for roles in the company, tasks to be done, and for shares of ownership.
But after the fact, those are just details, especially if the co-founders are good friends.
Greg was great with Django. He was ceaseless in championing our products. He could fix any problem just as soon as it popped up.
After his death, I didn’t find myself asking, “Can I go on without someone great with Django, someone who could champion our products, and someone who can fix bugs on the site?”
I found myself asking, “Can I go on without Greg?”
It’s been 12 days since his death. Only now is the answer to that question even beginning to shift towards Yes.
I suppose, in the end, the only way to prepare for an event like this is to set aside time away from the project. As they say, time heals all wounds. Even as someone who throws himself into his work to get away from stuff like this, I found myself simply unable to distract myself through it, since I worked so closely with Greg on a daily basis.
I won’t get back to work today, and probably not tomorrow, but I will get back to work. It’ll just never quite feel the same without Greg.
