R.I.P. Gator

Somewhere in the blowing dust and happy free creative fun of Burning Man, we lost one very dear to us. Gator's life was a gonzo ride from beginning to end. He was loved and treated like a king from the beginning, from the day I snatched him from a pet shop in New Orleans, raced cross town in a taxi, barely caught my train home from Mardi Gras and the two of us, my new little friend and I, settled into our First Class cabin on Amtrak.

And he was an outlaw, both when smuggled onto the train, and for the next few years living in California, the only state in the Union where ferrets are against the law. In that sense, we were perfect for each other: two outlaws wandering the West in search of Our People. We found Our People in the Art Car Family and in Karen. When Karen came along, Gator got the necessary coddling and care he began needing in his elder years. She became his mom, and held him tight as the end drew near.

In all, Gator traveled thousands of miles with in Duke, and appeared on my shoulder in Duke's first postcard shot and on several short Duke features on TV. Named for a baby alligator that leapt across my lap while canoeing in the swamps outside New Orleans, Gator went on to live in California, Arizona, Texas, Oregon and New Mexico, actually changing residences with me roughly 20 times. He was Duke's mascot, and in times when I was so depressed I couldn't get off the floor, he was the only one of the proper stature to visit me where I lay.

Humans can argue the existence of God or Heaven or the lack thereof until they piss themselves. But for my friend Gator as for all animals, there is a playground in the sky where his hind legs are strong again and he is frolicking in the grass with Sketch and Lucy and Fungus and all the rest of our dearly departed four-legged friends. Sleep sweetly my little prince.

— RSM September 6, 2000