life and death

Had a party this past weekend for my birthday. Lots of fun with only the closest of friends.
Daniel and Laura (new friends met in Vegas) and I ended up talking about people we know, plans, the future, dreams.
They were telling me about how they're going to produce several moves with Neal Fredericks. The guy is a D.P. - biggest credit was Blair Witch (ugh) but was really busting butt making a name for himself. Nice guy on all accounts.
Marianne and I are talking at an "indieclub" meeting in the next week, and supposedly Neal would be back from the Keys, where he's shooting. I messaged boarded with him a bit last week.

Past tense, present tense, future tense. They all get mixed up in a situation like this.

Got word this morning that Neal went down in an airplane while shooting. Crew got out, he didn't. He was tightly strapped in, with the camera.

He was dead when Dan and Laura and I were talking about those plans. Just, nobody knew it quite yet - hadn't recovered his body yet. Murky water due to Hurricane Charley and all.

You just don't know what to do. It's unfortunately the third person I know of (closely) that went down in a small airplane. All of them in "the biz", two of them camera men.

What can you say?
Life is fragile.