Last week I had the unfortunate honor of eulogizing my best friend, Chris Wurzburg. I am posting what I said here for those who were unable to attend the service:
Hi. I’m Kyle. I’m one of Chris’s best friends, of which there are many.
I didn’t sleep last night. At all. I was staring at a blinking cursor on my screen, attempting to put into words the hurricane of thoughts and emotions that has been flooding my brain for the past two weeks. I was thinking, “what could I possibly say that would help anyone in this room right now? What things do I know about Chris, that other people may not but should know, that articulate some of his qualities that some of us were lucky enough to experience?”
As I was sitting there, trying to figure this out, I just couldn’t shake the impulse that I always had when I was dealing with something particularly tough— every fiber of my being wanted to ask “I need your advice. Chris, what do I do?” That’s how it always was.
I’m sure it would come as no surprise to anyone here if I were to say that Chris sometimes liked to break the rules. What if we talked about that? I mean, we could sit here all day regaling each other with tales of Chris being the charming but delinquent goofball that he so loved being. He was one of my oldest friends but somehow I’m still learning new stories about wildly elaborate pranks he pulled and bizarre situations he found himself in.
But as fun as that would be, that didn’t feel like the right road to go down. And also, I don’t want to be the one to try and compete with the excitement with which he would tell those stories.
There were a few things that were immediately apparent about Chris. Things you could see from a mile away. He was talented. He was handsome, he was really, really funny, though he didn’t have to be, because he was so talented and handsome. He was wise, he was loyal, he was sometimes frustratingly stubborn. And Chris was absolutely, maniacally prolific.
This is what would happen when you’d go to Chris’s place, every time. Every single time, as long as I can remember. You’d open the door, and you’d walk in, and you’d be greeted with… the back of Chris’s head, because he’d be sitting at his computer writing music. He’d turn to you and say “hey, check out this new track I’m working on. I want to know what you think.” And he’d reach over to the keyboard, hit the space bar and BOOM. There it was. Some sounds he pulled out of thing air. Some words he bled straight from his heart. That was his music. And it wasn’t just an idea for a chorus, it was like, a complete, fully realized song! Every time it was different, and every time it was the new best thing he ever made.
And the best part was— as you’re listening, you’d look over and he’d be sitting there in his chair, just dancing to his own music. Shamelessly. He was so cool he could do that. Hit play on his own tunes and start grooving out. Chris was the coolest guy.
His music and his singular personality are things we could talk about all day, but again, those are the things you could see from a mile away. There was something else that I feel the need to talk about that I have had the privilege of witnessing over the years.
The moment that Chris left us, there were so many people who, like with the flick of a light switch, immediately felt not only incredibly sad, but scared, and lost. “Well what now?” “Who do I turn to when times get tough?” Just like I was thinking while writing this last night, there are a lot of people that so desperately want to go to Chris right now and ask him that question: Chris, what do I do?
I cannot overstate how grossly influential Chris Wurzburg was on the lives of those he came in contact with. He was the constellation that many of us sailed by, always ahead of us, but always making sure we were right behind him. With him, there was no if; just when. He never tried; he just did. And he allowed you to come along for the ride.
Chris was THE guy to go to for advice. Sometimes he was the angel on one shoulder, and sometimes, he was the devil on the other shoulder. And it was a pleasure learning the “subtleties” of his moral compass. There was one thing for certain though: he cared for those close to him fiercely, and would become whatever friend you needed him to be.
His personality had the gravity of a neutron star, pulling everything in his orbit in the right direction. You would have you, your normal self– and you would have your Chris version of you that would only come out when you were around him. You were probably more artistic, more open minded, more understanding, more accepting. Probably a little cooler.
But the thing that I witnessed happen over and over and over and over again over the years was this— Chris could see through people like an x-ray. He saw things in people that often they didn’t even see in themselves. A talent. A quality. An idea.
If you were lucky enough to have the Chris Wurzburg X-ray turned on you, you were lucky enough to find a door that you didn’t know you could open. There was probably some thing that you were scared to do that Chris would then lovingly pressure you to do. For me, he told me “Kyle, pick up that camera. Learn how to use a computer. Figure out how to make movies.”
Now, that is my career. Chris would find something in everyone around him and the effects of culturing that thing were absolutely transformative.
That’s one of the things that’s so hard about this. A lot of us feel lost at sea without an answer to that question: Chris, what do I do? I’ve been trying to figure out what he’d say about all this. And I can’t. That’s why Chris was Chris. But I can with 100% certainty tell you one thing he would say. One lasting piece of advice. He would tell you to do that thing, whatever that thing he found in you may be.
Write your song. Paint your masterpiece. Kiss that girl. Make that mistake. Start that new project. Pack up your stuff and move across the country. Have fun. Live your life. Be yourself, as brilliantly and unapologetically as you can. Hug your family. Power through the bad times. Cherish the good times. Tell those that you care about, that you love them. Do the thing.
I love you Chris. We all love you. And when we catch up to you, wherever you are, I can’t wait to hear the new stuff that you’ve been working on.
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