Remembering Dan

Many of us have ridden with Dan, and those who haven’t wish they had. I think we all know that Dan wants us to shop local, love our planet and ride our bikes. We all know that if he were heading out to the farm as he often did, it would be on bike.

I also know that many of us had future rides planned with Dan and so in his memory, in his honor and for all the rides we won’t be able to take with him, please join me, his family and other friends in biking. Not everyone owns a bike but this is the time to start so if you have an extra, please post on the facebook event wall or message me. I will be volunteering two (sadly mediocre) bikes of my own.

As sunset is at 8:30, we should be able to ride there and back during daylight but please bring helmets, reflectors and lights.

Again,
If you don’t own a bike, post that you need one!
If you own extra bikes, please post that you have them!

To quote his sister Julia
“of course we want everyone to come
however they can, but I’m positive that a bike ride is the way Dan
would have arrived-and wanted us to travel too”

Path is 4.4 Miles http://goo.gl/maps/W9rM which I’m allotting extra time for.

I will be checking here for comments but to help with coordinating bikes, please “attend” the facebook event. Dan Schreiber Memorial Ride

When I first met Dan, he was in junior high and I remember him wearing gray sweats, playing computer games. It was no surprise when he majored in computer science and I admired him going out of state for school. Being the youngest, he might have elected to stay close to home, but his adventurous siblings paved the way for exploration and risk-taking.

Each Schreiber kid is fantastically unique, lucid, strikingly beautiful, and verbally gifted. As I continued to learn stories of Dan over the years, I felt like he was a Schreiber “concentrate”. He was brilliant, beautiful, clever, social, hilarious, and inspired. I was tickled to see him expanding beyond just school into travel, food, folk dancing, literature, the organic movement, and music. He probably always had these interests, but he really blossomed in his 20s. He came into his own and constantly surprised those who loved him.

I love Julia like a sister, and she always gained such joy when Dan visited her farms. She always laughed and smiled when she spoke of Dan. My little brother is the same age and I am heartbroken for the Schreiber family. I will remember Dan, not only from my first impression, but from my last impression, which was at Julia’s wedding this time last summer. He was feeding us his first batches of chocolate in Julia’s kitchen and eloquently describing the physical, emotional, political, and sensory elements of his new craft. He seemed a grown-up to me then…sophisticated, observative, enlightened, and an equal. Though he was the youngest, he seemed wise beyond his years.

I don’t know what kind of story we’ll tell ourselves about Dan in the days, months, and years to come. While I want to believe he was just beginning a brilliant life, perhaps I should instead remember that he had already lived one and perhaps reached the apex of it. Like a shooting star, a perfect fruit, a divine experience, or a complex piece of chocolate, Dan, too, is gone too soon.

Since Dan started his “chocolate factory” this spring, he’s been selling his chocolate at the Urbana farmers’ market, where, of course, he had one of the most unique stalls.  He was always trying to improve it, make it more enticing in an offbeat way – more Dan.  (Each week would feature a new chocolate thought of the day, such as “smooth is not the only texture” or “chocolate is not candy.  chocolate is food.”)

When she learned of his death, Lisa Bralts, the market manager, decided that Dan’s space at the market would remain unfilled, so that people could leave something to remember him.  When the market closed today, these flowers and tokens were moved to the porch of the Common Ground Food Co-op, where they’ll stay up during the week.  Here’s just a few snapshots of what people left this week.

a gift of cabbage for the fermented food fanatic

Dear Dan…

chocolate equals love

dan

We’ve added an “Events” page to provide the latest information on events being planned for before and after the memorial service in Illinois. The page is located between the Memorial Services and How Can I Participate tabs.

The first bars from the new molds, warts (and caramel) and all.

Daniel’s tagline for Flatlander Chocolate was “chocolate with a sense of place.” The origin of the cacao beans was important to the flavor and character of the bars, and so was place of production. I designed this chocolate bar with Daniel to help communicate a sense of place: this is chocolate proudly made in Illinois. These were test bars Dan made with the new mold, and we was really excited about them.

Daniel’s favorite motifs, bicycle and silos. He loved the tornado.

It was exactly a year ago when Dan visited in Seattle.

I remember him proudly showing his current knitting project-in-progress and generously sharing some of his cacao nibs and chocolate tastes from his early bean roasting and chocolate making experimentation. He was excited, having just toured the Seattle Theo Chocolate factory, talked his way into the inner sanctum of the operation, and even procured some beans to work with. What with his enthusiasm for chocolate and my own love of that fine substance, I very much enjoyed following the experiments and musings on his blog.

Last winter Dan sent me a sampling of his wares (5 varieties), and with my husband and some of our foodie friends we orchestrated a blind chocolate tasting that intermixed some commercially made chocolates with Dan’s artisan delights. The accompanying beverage was a nice tawny port. Several of Dan’s chocolates fared quite well on the palates of the 6 tasters. There was a consensus that overall the DHS chocolate was much more complex and intriguing than the purchased contenders. I sent Dan a summary of our tasting notes and selflessly let him know that as his creations evolved, there were willing guinea pigs in Seattle ready to offer honest feedback any time he might desire it.

I was taken with Dan’s intense curiosity and his focus on the things that interested him. He was possessed of a keen intelligence as well as what seemed like boundless energy and goodwill. I was so looking forward to getting to know my young cousin as an adult, and watching where his adventurous spirit led him. I mourn his loss acutely.

My heart breaks anew again and again.

I met Daniel last September when one of our yoga teachers, Maggie Taylor, a good friend of Daniel’s, invited him to bring chocolates to a Mala Day celebration at our studio, Amara Yoga & Arts.  We started selling his chocolate as soon as he started to produce it.  He joined in the yoga and did several other chocolate tastings at our events, most recently a partner yoga class on June 25.  So he was well known and well loved by many students and staff and and we considered him a big part of Amara.

Daniel created a special chocolate bar for us – the Amarabar, using the hickory nuts I brought him.  This made us feel so special – having our very own chocolate bar created especially for us by Daniel.  It featured maple-roasted hickory nuts and sea salt and it was fabulous.  Of course it was a huge hit and we were planning to do a ‘golden ticket’ promotion, after Willy Wonka, where we would put a golden ticket in one Amarabar and the lucky recipient would win a big prize.  We had a riot talking with him about the possibilities and envisioning the clamor there would be for these candy bars.

Daniel was a wonderful and darling person and I was very fond of him.  He was so beautiful and kind, and he had an otherworldly quality about him. When you saw him and heard him talk you just wanted to laugh and grab him and squeeze his cheeks. The last time I saw him he was wearing khaki shorts and a white t-shirt and I remember thinking that he had to have been the cutest kid in the world, and wondered how his mother could stand him growing up and leaving home.

Needless to say I am horribly shocked and devastated at his passing, and I am so, so, sorry for his family.

I’m a friend of Dan’s brother Jon, and I didn’t know Dan very well. But I’ll always remember him as the tanned California boy in the photo above, taken when I first visited the Schreiber family in the late summer of 1997 (the date beside the pen reads September 4, 1997). And I’ll also always remember how excited Jon would get whenever he talked about his brother. This excitement never waned over the years, as I heard about Dan’s flowering from a young Schreiber prodigy into a UIC CS phenom and budding chocolate magnate. My heart goes out to the Schreiber family and all of Dan’s friends during this trying time.

If anyone would like to download an 8″ x 12″ print-ready version of the image above, click here.

Tim and I lived with Dan for close to two years.  We called him “Danza” though, a nickname that Tim had given him years ago when they first met – because, he said, Dan looked like a “Tony” rather than a “Dan.”  So they compromised in reference to Tony Danza.  Whatever the truth in that might be, the nickname stuck and that is what myself and a few others called him.  I have a lot of stories about Danza – he was the kind of guy that you always wanted to talk about.  I found myself telling stories about him to just about everyone – he somehow always managed to pop up as an anecdote in what seems like nearly every conversation I’ve ever had.

I have a couple stories I’d like to share:

Two summers ago Danza decided that he was going to bike across the country from Urbana to Palo Alto.  He packed his road bike with some absurd amount of day-old pastries that I had brought home from Paradiso (where I worked), a book, and not much else.  As someone from the West Coast, he had some idea in his head of a kindness he called “Midwestern Hospitality.”  He thought that on his way to California, he would knock on people’s doors and they would let him in and they would hang out, exchange stories, and let him stay the night – he thought it would be a great experience where he would get to interact with other people and “think great thoughts,” generate great ideas.  Tim and I warned him that this might not be the case, but he set off.  Within four days he had returned and I was so relieved to see him.  He had seen the Mississippi and reached the Illinois border and during that time had not experienced any “great Midwestern Hospitality,” just a lot of closed doors and strange looks.  He found shelter alongside barns for a couple of nights and then eventually turned around when he decided that the adventure was not going to be as amazing as he had expected – rather than thinking great thoughts he was fixating on the flat lands of Illinois and his boredom.  I loved him for thinking that Midwesterners were going to be so welcoming (as opposed to people from any other part of the United States) – and for being brave enough to set off on that trip all by himself with the best of hopes and faith in people.

One day Tim got it into his head that he wanted to get a mullet.  So Danza decided that he wanted a comb-over.  A friend shaved his head down the middle, straight to the scalp, clipped the sides fairly short, and left a strip of long hair on one side of the bald gap.  Then Danza gelled the scraggly strands and combed them right over.  He kept his hair that way for at least two weeks.  He taught a class at U of I too, and the strange thing was, he told me, not a single one of his students said anything.  Perhaps it was too embarrassing to be uttered out loud.  He had such an amazing and unique sense of humor.

It’s hard to believe that he will no longer be in my life.  That I won’t be able to glance up from my computer screen from my position on the couch to see him sitting on the neighboring one.  That he won’t be keeping me company at work in the early morning, drinking his cappuccino at the bar.  That I won’t be able to get riled up and have a friendly debate with him in our living room.  Or complain about the smell of the sauerkraut fermenting in our kitchen.  He was such a great person and friend and had so much energy

I have no hesitation in saying that Danza was the most unique individual I have ever met in my life.  He has made himself impossible to forget and I miss him so much

Danza, Dan M, Tim

Dan!  You are so great.  I remember meeting you for the first time at the Urbana Farmer’s Market last summer, it must have been.  I immediately noticed your hilarious spark, so excited to tell us about your chocolate, and to invite us (not even being acquaintances at the time) to your house for a “chocolate packaging party.”  I laughed and asked if you always get people to do your work for you by making it a party.  The next time we met, weeks later, I was flattered that you recognized me and called me by name.

You are SUCH a quirky guy, you are making me laugh just thinking of your goofy smile.  The memory I have of you in my mind right now is of you and Claire on the Phillip’s Center dance floor during contra dancing, and you, Dan, were having her teach you each and every differing techniques to swing your partner…  In my mind, that characterizes you well… wanting to fully soak up all these lost arts and try to revive them.  You were my contra dancing partner many times, and I loved it.  I always smiled extra big once I saw you were there :)

I think you knew how much I enjoyed and appreciated the dinner parties that you started, too….  I barely missed a one.  I left each time so excited about the type of people I was getting to know, and as a direct result, I was permanently inspired to begin my own dinner parties.  Each time I came to your parties, you gave me a great big hug at the door, even though we didn’t know each other super well.  I liked that.

Also, thank you for the pint of raw milk you so graciously gave me after one of the Sunday Samosa Brunches.  Sorry I never gave you your mason jar back, even though you asked me to :P  I did drink all of the milk, though.  It was delicious.

One more memory…  Once I was walking to Paradiso from Allen, and I saw you across the street.  I yelled to you, “Hi Dan!” and you scampered back over across the street without missing a beat, said a nice hello and gave me a hug, even though you had somewhere you had to be.  That made my day.

Even though we were not extremely close, it really hit me hard to hear of your passing.  These past few days, I couldn’t keep from thinking about you, wishing you were still around.  The ideas you had for the community were so exciting!  They were so impressive, and you were actually doing it. I supported you the entire way :).  There has been a sinking feeling in my stomach as soon as I heard the news, but reading about people’s memories of you helps keep you alive.  I think it’s very healing.

In general, I like you a lot.  I wish you were still here.  I’m sending you love, wherever you are, sending your family love, and wishing you endless peace.

dan, you are cared about and thought of. always.

Love,

Jenny Goodwine