Goodbye, Dear Sweet Michael

This weekend, much of the DC design community — in addition to friends, family, and even those who didn’t know him — said goodbye to a treasured friend.

Michael Schmidt was designer Barry Dixon’s partner — in EVERY way. Not only were they life partners for at least 20 years, they were business partners as well. But beyond that basic description, Michael was simply, as the gorgeous card from the memorial service program states, amazing.

I didn’t know him beyond business or social situations, but I find myself mourning him as if he were my best friend. Why? Because he was the best example of a human being there is. Not many of us are lucky enough to meet one.

Barry and Michael were (and Barry still is — bless our Lord HE is still with us) the greatest illustrations of a true gentleman. I have never once heard an unkind word from them. Whenever Michael’s name comes up (or Barry’s — “Barry and Michael” was one word, as far as I was concerned), it elicits a sigh of admiration.

But enough from me. I’d like to share with you the heartfelt stories from Michael’s closest friends as they expressed them during the service Saturday at St. James Episcopal Church in Warrenton, VA.

The sun came out before the service, after a morning of soft snowfall.

We all stepped through these lovely red doors to hear memories of Michael.

This was easily was the most elegant remembrance and reception I’ve ever attended, in a chapel more than two centuries old with an alter graced with long-stemmed white tulips and a large stand of branches with flowering quince blossoms.

"Can you think of any color of the rainbow he could NOT wear?" longtime friend and designer Charlotte Lekakos asked. "Seriously, do you know anyone else would could wear ORANGE?"

The service was preceded by a small chamber orchestra playing the Fall and Winter portions of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. After an opening hymn of “Morning has Broken”  and an introductory prayer, Mark Lowham rose to read excerpts from William Wordsworth’s “Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood” (see the entire poem here).

He first started by saying Wordsworth wrote it around this time of year, in the deepest winter, but remembering the joys and inspirations of life as we first saw them with a child’s eye. “Wordsworth might just as well have been thinking of Michael,” Mark said, and bid us all the listen to the words and “capture a moment, or two, or three, of Michael — and capture that joy forever.”

“And with the heart of May doth every beast keep holiday; –Thou Child of Joy, Shout round me, Let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy!” The poem states (how appropriate that Michael was born in May). And at the end, equally appropriate, this: “What though the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my sight, Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower, We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind; In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be; In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of human suffering; In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind.”

Barry chose the Wordsworth poem for Mark to read.

Next up was Charlotte Lekakos, who read a poem that Barry and Michael’s dear friend Dianne Strauss wrote but who was unable to come from out West to read herself. Barry “said that this poem has brought him so much comfort, that he wanted to share it with all of you,” Charlotte said.

(For those of you who didn’t know him well, feel free to scroll past it, but I feel it’s worth repeating.)

When angels are called to heaven – we have to let them go.

It is their choice

And it is

For us to love them,

To let them be –

In peace –

And to fly.

Michael Schmidt was a gentle man.

He was the man who would walk me down the aisle

– side by side with Barry—

when I would marry.

He is the human being

I – unconditionally –

Chose to walk through life with.

He is the life partner of my dearest friend.

Michael is the spirit who gleefully showed

his beloved goats

with such joy and benevolence

on a warm Summer’s day…

Suspended in time and space,

We crossed the land,

En route to a new wonder…

In honor of him –

Please remember –

Each and every day that –

Michael stood tall

In life –

As it IS.

It is for those of us who LIVE,

To live with his magnificence,

His shine,

And to carry on his reverent note.

Michael will reveal to us in time what we need to know

Here on earth and in heaven.

Michael IS and shall always be an exquisite life force.

Full of light and energy.

A divine and beloved presence.

So – there is not doubt – that here on this day –

We are honoring and celebrating the life of an angel.

From the moment I saw him and from the moment we spoke – I knew.

No matter what.

This spirit has huge wings! And, when he moves – you knew. The air, wind and earth

Preceded Michael – even before he entered the room. You could feel him. He was

Near… And, then, this wonderous creation of God was in the room.

Michael is and will forever be in the chambers of our hearts and souls – in the room

With all of us who loved him dearly. His gift is that huge! That large. That vast.

So – in peace –

My blessings for all time

To Michael William Schmidt for the touch of his hand,

The warmth of his heart and the grandeur of his care.

These photos of Michael at a friend's wedding were posted just a few days ago on his Facebook page.

After Charlotte finished reading the poem, she acknowledged the love of his legions of female fans.

“We were smarter, more witty, more attractive, sometimes even beautiful” in his company, she said. He must of had “a secret playbook for women from 9 to 90 and how to seduce them,” she continued — “maybe it was all the episodes he watched of ‘Sex and the City.’ ” He would notice if you lost “two and a half pounds, and tell you how fabulous you looked,” she noted. Somehow, he would politely NOT notice if you gained anything.

At parties and gatherings, she said, “Michael would flirt and charm all present, of all generations. He wouldn’t discriminate at all. He was an equal-opportunity lover. He put all women under his spell. … When we remember him, girls, let’s remember that we were fortunate to be in the right place at the right time to know him at all.”

Longtime friend Norma Ramsey, pictured above with Michael and Barry, spoke next.

“Loyal. kind. radiant. COLOSSAL,” Norma said. “This is a guy who changed the trajectory of everyone’s life situation that he touched. Just when you thought you were having the time of your life, Michael showed up.

“He was the Pied Piper who easily brought us along on all his journeys. We typically didn’t know where we were going; we just wanted to be there with him. He WAS Amazing Grace.”

She proceeded to tell funny stories about Michael’s life as a gentleman farmer (to put it nicely). “Who remembers that first pumpkin patch? He didn’t know how to grow pumpkins! He trucked him in on his pickup truck!” But he soon mastered gardening, tending chickens and goats … and learning how to ride horses and hunt.

“Whips, hounds, huntsmen and foxes — that sounds like the start of a perfect night with Michael,” she said.

He was so proud of his riding gear, he would even run errands in it, Norma noted. When he wore it to ride horses at a western dude ranch, she said, all the cowboys called him Fancy Pants.

Moving back to the subject of women, Norma added, “Every man wanted to be him, and every female just plain and simply WANTED him. Every woman he ever met thought she could be THE ONE who could bring Michael to the other side!”

A typical party where Michael was surrounded by women. Here, he stands with designers Victoria Neale, Laura Jens, Gloria Blalock, and art dealer Evelyn Avery at a launch party last year for Barry's new line of fabrics.

But Barry, Norma said, looking down at him during the service, “He was so desperately proud of you, as I know you were of him. Together, you were creative magic. Michael will always be in your heart and etched in your soul.”

Michael sets up for a photo shoot for an online sale last month on One Kings Lane.

David Pannell, Barry’s brother-in-law, spoke next. “Let me just say that Michael made QUITE and impression,” he said, comparing him to “an upscale Barry White.”

When he first met David’s wife (Barry’s sister), he gave her “a full bear hug. She swooned and had to be resuscitated,” David said dryly. “I was always thankful that he was a gentleman, and spoken for, and gay.”

He went on: “I mean by gentleman, he had a gentle, merry spirit. I mean that he was pure hearted. I mean that he always made people around him feel like better versions of themselves. … Sometimes, we cannot save even the people we love, and so we are left without the satisfaction of a complete narrative. We need to be grateful for the pages of the story where our lives intersected. They are all that we have, and they will have to be enough.”

Pat and Roseann McGeehin, who met Barry and Michael as clients almost 20 years ago, quickly grew to be among their closest friends.

The four of them pose on one of their many travels together.

They both came forward to give a Top Ten of Michael’s best-remembered traits.

10. His infectious laugh.

9. His inability to keep a secret. Roseann shared a story where Michael would conspire with her to hide purchases from her husband during trips, “only to mention in passing at dinner that the bags in the closet were taking up room from their clothes!”

Michael poses jauntily with Roseann McGeeehin.

8. His (poor) joke telling. “He really only had three jokes in his repertoire, and he would blow the punchline every time!” Pat said.

7. His love of masks. And not just Halloween masks, Roseann said. “God forbid he would go to bed without putting on a facial mask to clean his pores — at one in the morning!”

6. Game partners. Barry and Roseann tended to team up against Michael and Pat. He would accuse Barry and Roseann (who generally would win) of cheating every time.

5. Is it grouper, or groper? “One night, Michael made the memorable mistake of ordering groper instead of grouper at dinner.” From then on, Roseann said, he tended to avoid the fish and lean toward safer fare, such as veal chops.

4. Snorkeling. Imagine, if you will, two six-foot-five men in full snorkel regalia (“I never knew that Prada did a line of snorkel gear!” Pat said), running down the beach, flippers and all. “Barry yells out, ‘sea snake!’ ” and that was it. “Roseann and I are sitting in our chairs, laughing our a– (er,) butts off!”

3. Singing. Michael had two songs that he sang — Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, and Happy Birthday, and he sang both spectacularly badly. He called Roseann each year to sing Happy Birthday to her over the phone, a la Marilyn Monroe. “Normally, I would get it on my voice mail, but I was lucky enough this year, on Nov. 30, to hear it live.”

2. Little brother. “I’m a 5’6″ guy talking about a 6’5″ guy,” Pat said, but.. “Michael had an innocence about him — not naivete, but an innocence. I felt sometimes that he needed protection.” And vice versa. “Michael, like a little brother, was always there for us when we had our problems. I’m going to miss him dearly.”

1. My big brother. As an only child, Roseann said, “I was lucky enough, 18 years ago, to meet Michael and Barry, and he was the big brother I never had.”

Once the reflections were over, a soloist sang an mournful and eloquent version of Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel.” We all recited the Lord’s Prayer, Prayers for the Departed, and The Commendation: “Receive him into the arms of thy mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light, Amen.”

And as the service started with Fall and Winter from the Four Seasons, we all stood while the chamber players played Spring and Summer — a contemplative, hopeful ending.

What followed, in typical fashion for Barry, was a reception in its finest form: packed with friends, family and well-wishers, sharing stories about Michael. Barry received guests who walked through the kitchen, standing there for what must have been hours, greeting every soul who came to comfort him, but in turn gave comfort to them.

My lasting memory of the day was driving up to the house in a long line of cars coming from the church, and as we drove up that long driveway, up a hill toward the house, we could see a lone bagpiper, and hear his mournful strains even through the closed car windows.

Yes, we were all sad at this gorgeously orchestrated reception, but leave it to Michael to bring together so many friends, so much fondness, and so much warmth. We’ll miss you Michael, and we’ll continue to embrace Barry with all his elegance, style and class.