Garry Joseph Dzyacki (1941-2024) was an artist, a lover of Granny’s Attic and unfinished projects, an eternal lottery optimist, a twice-husband to Irene Otis, and a father to Grace Dzyacki, Lucas Dzyacki and Shady Cosgrove. Despite his best efforts, he died loved, with family around him.

Garry, you drove us angry and worried and crazy, but we are testament that complicated love is real love, too.

When someone dies, the gift of their complete life is bequeathed back to us. Of course there’s his trailer and the abandoned cars out front, and his ability to pick a fight with common sense. But there are profound kindnesses, too. Shady and Garry searching for agates in Arcata, California. Garry, patient on the couch, as toddlers Grace and Lucas tumble over him. Garry building a silk-screen station for Irene’s tiles. Garry gifting lavish boxed dinners for friends and family who lived close. He savoured Christmas and adored his dachshunds. He loved Vashon Island, arriving when he was twenty-five to build a deck and staying for the rest of his life.

Garry was a man of few words and large presence, a graduate of Central Washington University, who taught his loved ones the tenets of radical acceptance, often via frustration.

Garry, you old goat: we love you.