In Memorium: Martele d’Acre
Author: Theolyn Maryash
With every year’s ending comes a time when we think about fresh starts, make new promises, set our minds to new goals. As we embark on our journey through 2016, we have time to reflect on what the previous year had brought us... and what it had taken away.
On November 9th, TarValon.Net’s community lost an old member and a dear friend: Martele d’Acre Gaidin passed away due to surgery complications.
Martele Gaidin joined TarValon.Net in 2006. As he revealed in his Senior Member inteview, he was introduced to the Wheel of Time series by a friend, but he continued reading past book 3 only when he found TarValon.Net. In May 2008, he became the newest Gaidin in the Val’Cueran pack.
Martele Gaidin attended multiple official events, among which was Fall Ball 2008, where his wife Muerandah d’Acre was raised to Aes Sedai of the Green Ajah, which was followed by their bonding.
Outside TarValon.Net, Martele Gaidin was also a husband, a loving father of two sons and a daughter, a grandfather to six grandchildren.
Following the sad announcement, numerous TarValon.Net members said their last goodbyes to Martele Gaidin - those who knew him well, those who had met him, and those who have only heard of him.
Lillian Sedai wrote a touching poem in his honour:
Sorrow bends our heads,
but we are not dead.
Memories wash over us,
but will not get the best of us.
To live is to honour,
with laughter and candor,
those that nurtured us,
with such care and devotion.
Weep for the one lost to sight,
as is right,
but remember to honour
a life with life.
And just as the poem says, while we as a community will mourn, we will always honour those that are no longer with us by cherishing the traces they had left in our lives. Martele Gaidin was and always will be an inseparable thread of TarValon.Net’s very own Pattern.
As Mother put it:
“The Light shine on you, Martele Gaidin, and may you shelter in the palm of the Creator's hand. The last embrace of the mother welcome you home. We'll miss you here.”
May we meet you again in a new Age, Martele Gaidin.
