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Matt Gilliland's Celebration of Life — Parallax Forums

Matt Gilliland's Celebration of Life

edited 2024-07-29 05:02 in General Discussion

Hi Ken and Parallax family,

Please let me know if this is an okay spot to post. Matt passed away last month on 6/12 after a long battle with Early Onset Alzheimer's. We couldn't miss him more. His Celebration of Life is Sunday, July 28th, 2024 at Calvary Bible Church on Hwy 174 in Grass Valley, CA at 2pm. Everyone is welcome to come if you'd like to join us.

I know Dad enjoyed his Parallax family and all the friends he made through Parallax. Thank you all for being such a bright chapter in his life!

-MaddieC
(Formerly MaddieG)

Comments

  • JonnyMacJonnyMac Posts: 9,144

    Very sorry to learn of Matt's passing. God bless Matt, and may God comfort his family and friends.

  • My condolences for Matt's family and friends.

    Matt was a great guy - such an energy and creative spirit - may the memories he lived carry on forever.

  • ...he was a great help to me in the early days of learning the BS2.

    (sigh)

    .

  • VonSzarvasVonSzarvas Posts: 3,474
    edited 2024-07-18 15:27

    Just a heads-up for a few folk given the short time until Matt Gilliland's service:
    @"Ken Gracey" @erco @"WBA Consulting" @"Duane Degn" @Whit

  • SavageCircuitsSavageCircuits Posts: 260
    edited 2024-07-18 16:49

    Matt was a great friend and helped me with some personal things in the wake of losing my wife. He will be greatly missed.

    Matt helped me with a great many projects I did. I will always be grateful for his help.

    Sadly, I am back on the East Coast and cannot make it to the celebration, however, I will deliver some words to the celebration by proxy.

  • Good man lost. Peace, love and best wishes to his family.

  • ercoerco Posts: 20,257

    OMG, just seeing this after summer travelling and still recovering from a bout with Covid. I'm so sorry to hear this news.

    Matt was an amazing friend. We were fast online friends, traded forum quips constantly. We finally met IRL at Parallax's Expo in 2012. Such an awesome, funny, well-rounded guy, he was my "brother from another mother". I am truly saddened to hear this, he was such a lively and vibrant fellow. And generous with his time, talent and treasures. At the expo, he loaded me up with all sorts of goodies, including a glass beer stein made by one of his kids... maybe you Maddie?

    I'm sorry I won't be able to attend his CoL as I'm still in Covid quarantine. But I will be there in spirit with thoughts and prayers. God bless Matt, Maddie and the Gilliland family at this very difficult time.

  • Matt's service was a wonderful celebration of life and I am so glad I was able to attend. I was grateful to hear from his family and friends that the inspirational and integrity filled person I knew through Parallax adventures was that way in everything he did. I loved seeing the pictures with him and his family over the years in the slideshow.
    While I will mourn Matt's absence, I will always cherish the friendship we had. Whether it be our lunch outings, the projects we worked on together, the advice he gave me on many topics, or just the solid memories of him being such a genuine man of God. My thoughts and prayers are with his entire family.

  • Thank you @MaddieCwasMaddieG for posting here and to everyone else for your responses.

    Thanks @SavageCircuits for pointing me to this post by phone today! (I don't get here often)

    @"WBA Consulting" - I'm so happy you were able to attend and so appreciate you sharing your thoughts about his CoL here! Like @erco, I'm getting over the COVID crud and had to just imagine what his event was like. It sounds like a wonderful event deserving of Matt and his legacy of friends and family. God bless the whole Gilliland family. We miss you, Matt.

  • SavageCircuitsSavageCircuits Posts: 260
    edited 2024-07-30 12:36

    Thank you @MaddieCwasMaddieG for having our words spoken at Matt's Celebration of Life.

    Thank you @"Jeff Martin" for sharing some memories of Matt with me over the phone.

    Thank you @"WBA Consulting" for describing some of the Celebration of Life to me. It was nice to know.

    And now, I will share here what I said regarding Matt, as he has left an indelible mark on my life. This is what was said on my behalf at Matt's Celebration of Life:

    "Matt Gilliland was a great friend whom I first met when he came to Parallax about a second edition of a book he wrote. In fact, the first edition book is how I even knew who he was as I owned it. During the time we both worked at Parallax, I designed several demos for products. Matt helped me create the enclosures, frames and backboards for many of these demos, often using a laser cutter. I valued his feedback on my projects and he valued my input on ideas he came up with. In 2015 after my wife (Wendy) passed away, I was having a spiritual crisis. My spiritual side was in some conflict with my science side. I didn’t know who I could talk to. Matt understood. He said he believed that God had sent me to him. He helped me to overcome my spiritual conflict and find peace in the wake of losing my wife and I will never forget him or what he told me.

    Matt told me a story…he asked me, “Chris, do you know how I am sure God exists?”, then he reached into his pocket and pulled out an acorn. I thought it was a bit strange, to be honest. Matt had an acorn in his pocket! But he held the acorn in one hand and his sunglasses in the other hand and he said, “God made this acorn. Man made these sunglasses. Man can make more sunglasses, but they can’t replicate by themselves. We have to create them. God made this acorn, and this acorn can make a tree, which can then make more acorns.” Matt pointed out that we were surrounded by all these buildings and things that man made, that would one day be gone. But, we were also surrounded by things that God made, and that those things would go on forever, even when the things that man made were gone. Even after man was gone. To be honest, I was completely unprepared for his unique perspective on life and God. But it was a truly inspiring story that I will never forget, and I wanted to share it with those who came to his life celebration!"

    Over the weeks following that conversation, we had more personal discussions on spirituality and life. He helped me to gain a new perspective on life and in September 2023 I finally married again. I look at things...life, much differently now than I did before. We never know how much time we have here. So make the best of it. My thoughts and prayers are with Matt's family as of late.

  • Tracy AllenTracy Allen Posts: 6,664
    edited 2024-08-05 21:46

    Chris,
    Thanks much for sharing. I didn't know Matt that well, and appreciate your heartfelt story. I met Matt and enjoyed his company at Parallax events. And of course there was his writing. I'll just share a couple of photos...
    First the cover of The Cookbook. A great read, with straightforward sections on Input devices, Output devices and Other Circuits. I'm sure it got a lot of folks started with their projects, and as a reference. Matt was also a great presence on the Parallax forums.

    The second photo is from the frontspiece of the initial installment in the Stamps in Class series. See how the synergy between Matt and Parallax began. Thanks, Matt! RIP

    360 x 527 - 81K
    720 x 518 - 175K
  • Tracy,

    I did not know about the Stamps in Class connection. Matt was far too modest to talk about such things. Thanks for sharing that.

  • Wow, thanks Tracy! I also didn't know about Matt's direct connection to Stamps in Class! I'd have thought that would have come up somewhere in my many talks with him, but as Chris said, he was very modest. I can say from experience that Matt was more apt to praise others for all kinds of things most people would take for granted and hearing him say those things was quite humbling and a great learning experience.

  • I didn’t know that either, until I started flipping through Parallax books on my shelf. Another one that I got a kick out of was Matt’s book on commandeering inkjet cartridges.

  • Sad to hear of Matt's passing. He was always eager to help. I have and will cherish his books. RIP Matt!

    Paul

  • I'm sorry to hear of Matt's passing. Like Tracy I only knew him from the forums or the few times I met him during visits to Parallax, but he was always eager to share what he was working on, explain the processes, and answer my (sometimes dumb) questions.
    My sincere condolences to you Maddie, and all of his family and friends.

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