Tymmdogg
The post from May 13th, third anniversary of Tim Wetzel's death. A chance to rejoice in the memories of his life, and look forward to seeing him again!
We met Tim at wedgwood. He worked at the boys unit right across the hall from where i work now, and did Young Life club with me. Tim and i met for real at Young Life club, where he and his twin brother Aaron (with whom i'd already become aquainted) were volunteer leaders. My first impression of him (them both, really) was probably the most common one: "TAAALLL!!! Baggy clothes. Hmm, bump on his chest...? Cool guys!" My very first foray into the realm of extremely ridiculously baggy jeans was when Tim let me wear some of his for the first YL club i was part of, where i was Guy (or "Man"), Dude and Dude's friend. They both told me i was a crackhead. Later that night, as Karen and i were leaving, i mentioned my computer, and Aaron was like "How fast?" and i was like, "I've got a Celeron 300A overclocked to 450MHz and a TNT2 video card" and he goes "Over-WHAT??? to HOW FAST???" and Aaron's and my friendship has been cemented ever since. Tim didn't like computers yet, so he kind of made fun of us that new years party (the 1999-2000 one) when we were all playing multiplayer games.dove and nails Karen knew Tim from working on the same campus, and she immediately liked him a very much amount, so when he came over to burn copies of his band Task At Hand's demo CD (music available here) she was of course fine with that. Eventually, Tim saw the folly of his "not liking computers" thing, and got an AMD K6-2 450MHz system with a Rage Pro Turbo AGP card backed up by a Voodoo2 PCI 3D-only card.
So then we started having little mini-LAN parties, where Karen and i would take our computers over to his apartment and connect to each other and play mostly Midtown Madness, but sometimes Unreal Tournament. He was always the best person to have at a LAN party, so friendly, patient, funny, and so on! I miss him a lot.
Right, so some of the most dear memories i have of Tim (Tymmdogg): he invented the term CYBERJOCK, which means "a person who is very good with computers, but is not a jerk about it, helping those less knowledgable with patience and courtesy, like a nice jock who is willing to help the less athletic but with computers, not sports." That sticker on the back of his van was the first cyberjock sticker ever, and he liked it a lot. We made it with silver retroreflective tape and black sign stickers. His tattoos were a permanent statement of his strong faith in God: the hebrew words for grace and emmanuel, a cross, a dove and nails, and a big old Jesus Fish or Icthus, which Dave Wildey did with a "jailhouse gun" that he made, and finally a trinity knot. Tim would use his body ink as a way to evangelize, particularly to those who seem magnetically attracted to tattoos and magnetically repulsed from church.
Another cherished memory was from a LAN party. Tim's cherished little brother, Richard, had a complete junk Acer computer with specs so pathetic, that typing them would seem obscene. We went upstairs to where Richard was already set up, and Tim went over and started disassembling his computer. I think he even started unscrewing the CD-ROM drive before Richard turned it off. Richard said "Uh, what are you doing?" and Tim told him, "Oh, can you power down your machine?" so Richard obliged. After removing the only parts worth anything, (CD-ROM, hard drive, memory, Voodoo2 video), Tim picked up the machine and carried it downstairs where - in front of Richard and all of us - Tim lobbed the computer into the air, watching it crash to the parking lot. Richard really liked having his Very Own Computer 'cause he was, like, twelve, so he repeated "Uh, what are you doing?" with a concerned grin on his face. I'm not sure when he deduced that there was something better in store, maybe when Tim handed him the baseball bat. Richard smashed and smashed, watching with glee as CMOS chips, chunks of circuit board and jagged wrinkled shards of metal flew through the air. Eventually a twisted chassis and box of microchips were all that was left, which went into the dumpster, and walking back upstairs rewarded Richard with a much faster system than he'd walked down with. I don't remember the details - it might have been a Celeron 566 that would do 850MHz. I put the parts together, and Tim, me, Rick Senior and Dave and maybe others chipped in to pay for the new hookup. Richard is still using the case today, although it looks somewhat different, and now contains a water cooling system. The look on Richard's face when he saw the new machine was absolutely amazing. I think i almost cried. Seriously.
That was one of Tim's favorite pictures of himself, because as he put it "I actually look cool!" Hmm... yeah, he always looked cool to those who knew him. He loved people. Karen told him once that she wished he'd quit smoking, because she wanted him to live to be really old. Tim told her that he wasn't going to die of smoking related disease, he was going to die doing something he loved. I guess God told him that much, because that's what happened.
He loved music as well, going everywhere with his guitar, and being part of a band for most of his adult life. Shade of Grace, Cephas (perhaps the most successful of his bands) and Task at Hand are the ones I know of. He recorded his first all-by-himself song, Music to Frag By (which should be Music by Which to Frag, but that was before my obsession with prepositions) with nothing but his super cool electric guitar and computer. He just kind of FIGURED IT OUT, which impressed me no end. He went on to make two VERY well done industrial mixes based on movies, Transformers, and Aliens. I've never met anyone who could figure stuff out like he could... i mean, i'm pretty good, but i never met myself. Heavy music really spoke to Tim. In his van, he'd crank really aggressive, fast tracks and just go nuts, pounding the wheel and saying "so much energy!" He really liked punk, particularly covers of 80's songs. John Denver was a favorite... Bill Maloney and the Vigilantes of Love were also a favorite... but more favorite. Tim introduced us all to Brian Regan, the funniest comic alive. I remember one Tuedsay night, Tim played some of Brian Regan's stuff, and Travis was seriously almost falling off his chair laughing so hard. I think he did fall off his chair one time.
I told some people at work today that it was the third anniversary of Tim's death, and they were very sympathetic. But i rejoice and praise God that i got to be part of Tim's life here on earth. Sure, i want him here still, and i would love to be able to have him know my kids and share in my life. But what we've got - all of us - is pretty amazing, and when we share it with others, we're taking part in what we shared with Tim - love, fellowship, Godliness... i dunno, maybe i'm not making much sense, but i think about Tim, and i'm glad, not sorrowful. Tim was an earnest follower of Jesus, a faithful friend, always honest, never hurtful, like, First Corinthians 13, the love chapter describes well the way Tim lived his life. I can only seek God's help to live my life the same way!
the actual date is May 14th. But the date is not the important thing.
-- juanito (Email) (URL) - 15 May '04 - 11:19Well juanito I finally came across your blog after you mentioned it. This section is something that had me crying at work which made me look strange. I know I don’t show much in the way of emotions to some people but if you could ask tim he would tell you that is just me on the outside. In all reality I miss tim alot after my stepping out of Cephas Tim was the only member to reach out and apologize for making me want to leave. It was not to long after we met at denny’s to have this disccusion he went to be with the one he loved most. I heard crap from some for being so upset and saying I was showing out. I truely was not I was very hurt not only had I lost someone that had admited he was wrong for treating me a certian way and had become close with me again but I was in the midst of a divorce that tim had been trying to help me through. He was strong and he also help me to not blame God for what was happening in my life I was struggling alot. You know not alot of people knew tim the way I did heck I took him to see his second non christian concert the first being john denver. WHERE DO I TAKE HIM BIOHAZARD AND SLAYER HA! Tim looked truely fightened but we got to meet Evan,Billy, and Bobby from biohazard we had a good time. I think the thing that makes me miss him most is the super bowl he and I would go to the store buy a bucket of fried chicken and 3 sixpacks of lemonade and watch the super bowl together.Man I miss him I am sorry for taking up so much space. I just push this stuff to the back of my head all the time and reading this just compeled me write. I miss him very much
-- Jason Moore (Email) (URL) - 05 October '04 - 15:52oh yeah that photo of him playing was prolly the best time I ever had in that band rocking the basement of the first asembly of God in traverse city with six feet deep, and feast eternal. Man!
-- Jason Moore (Email) (URL) - 05 October '04 - 15:56thanks for the comments. Being a friend of Tim shaped me more than most things in my life. He was and is a great person, who i miss deeply, and am eager to see again.
-- juanito (Email) (URL) - 05 October '04 - 22:42no juanito I have to thank you for having a tribute to someone who made this world a better place to live. I am definately a better person for having known tim, and long for the day I can give him an ooggie!
-- Jason Moore (Email) (URL) - 07 October '04 - 15:57