Editor's Note: I was lucky enough to call Dave Graham my friend. Many Tacomans could make the same claim. After all, Dave Graham was Tacoma, overlapping many circles, advancing music, film and the arts at every turn. Dave Graham, 49, passed away May 17, 2014, after a courageous battle with cancer. With his passing, each of the circles will never fully enclose again - especially the circles housing Dave's good friend, John Kephart. Below, Kephart pays tribute to his friend, Dave Graham.

I knew Dave Graham before I knew I knew Dave Graham. We went to the same high school together and even hung out in the same group. I was a lowly freshman who fell in with the "bad" older kids, the misfits who hung out along the wall outside of the science classroom where the eyes of the adults seldom went. These were the oddballs who didn't fit into the usual high school cliques because they liked woodshop and art class instead of athletics and academia. They'd stand against that wall smoking, BS-ing and doing who-knows-what other transgressions against school policy (though I have a pretty good idea).

Dave Graham was among those kids, though I don't remember him. I don't remember him even in the slightest. I was too wrapped up in my own trivial concerns and dramas to give very much thought to this group of upperclassman who'd taken me under their wing. They were really only a small part of my school life anyhow. I didn't smoke or drink or curse the vice-principal with them. I just ...  hung out on occasion, standing against that brick wall.

Flash-forward to the mid-2000s. I can't pinpoint the exact year or place that we became reacquainted. It must've been one of the art events that are, sadly, no longer a staple of the Tacoma scene - maybe Kulture Lab, or a 100th Monkey party, or perhaps even at the late, lamented Panamonica's bar. Dave, of course, remembered me from high school. And, being his warm, effusive self, we became friends. Whenever we were around together somewhere, I was always amazed - at first, anyway - by how many people greeted him by name, and he them. Was there anyone in Tacoma who wasn't on a first name basis with this guy?

Dave soon became my go-to buddy whenever I wanted to do something. See a band play? I called Dave. Check out the new Wes Anderson film at the Grand? Dave. Go have a bite to eat? Play trivia at Meconi's? Take a road trip? Yep, Dave. And if I needed a resource for a film I was working on, Dave was the guy who had the answer - or knew someone who did. His connection to Tacoma and its people was nothing short of amazing.

When I learned cancer had infected Dave - the remnant of something that had been surgically removed as a young adult had now returned with a vengeance - I know I wasn't alone in thinking he would beat it. Sure, he was diagnosed Stage 4 melanoma cancer, but this was David Graham we were talking about! If anyone would end up victorious, it would be him. He would outlive us all. Isn't that how the cliché goes? And for a while, this seemed to be true. I regret not being able to keep more of his texts to me - hilarious, sometimes inappropriate in a way that would probably leave some people offended - but space had to be made to receive new phone messages. One of the ones I kept (and still have) came in on June 6, 2013:

"No more cancer!"

I don't think either of us really believed it, though.

A couple of months later, while still working at Boeing (miserably) and living in Everett (also miserably), he texted me to say that he planned to work one more month before moving back to Tacoma, to "make film and music while I can."  He said he knew he was technically still terminally ill, though he was feeling pretty good. "Statistically though, I should have been dead by now."

>>> Dave Graham, left, and author of this tribute, John Kephart, were ready to take on all trivia teams in 2012. Photo credit: Pappi Swarner

His condition, however, never interfered with his getting around in the city he loved and the places where he loved to go: 1111, The New Frontier, Puget Sound Pizza and, most of all, the Java Jive. I listened with rapt attention to his Java Jive stories, about the days I missed out on all because I hadn't really known him in high school. If I had, he probably wouldn't have had to tell me about hanging out with the future members of Nirvana while Courtney Love and an underage Neko Case washed bottles in the kitchen; habitually dropping in for a drink there after coming back late in the evening from a show in Seattle; sleeping by the Jive's fireplace after closing down the place. ...

Dave's cancer didn't hinder his concerns for those he cared about, either. While still able to get around, he made a point to visit his good friend John Markert, who also was terminally ill. He kept in contact with John's daughter to find out which hospital or private hospice care facility John had been moved to. Sadly, John passed just one week before Dave. I never learned his reaction to this because by this point Dave - who'd moved out of Tacoma for the final time, to his brother's house on South Hill - was coming toward the end of his own life. I'm sure he must've been devastated, though. But that was Dave, always more concerned for others than for himself.

I was lucky enough to get to see Dave one last time before he left us. Our good friend Will Kane snuck me in on the pretext of returning some of Dave's guitars. His family (minus Dave's daughter, Amber) didn't know I was coming. Though taxed as they were by the constant care needed to make sure Dave was comfortable in his last days - the reason for the "no visitors" rule that had recently been implemented - I was graciously allowed to sit with Dave for a while, to talk to him. He was heavily medicated and couldn't respond, didn't make eye contact, but I was told he could hear my voice and knew I was there.

And now ... there's a Dave Graham-sized hole in my life. Who will I call when I want to do something fun but don't want to do it by myself? Or when I need a sympathetic ear from someone who understands me, the way only a close friend does? Or I need someone to read a manuscript that I'm writing and give his honest opinion? Sure, I have other friends, but not one I can reach out to as easily as I could to him. That I could pick up the phone and call, knowing he'd be there on the other end of the line, was always a great joy to me. It's hard to imagine the Java Jive, or Meconi's, or anywhere else in Tacoma without him. The only comfort I can take is knowing with absolute certainty that anyone else fortunate enough to have been a part of his life feels the same sense of devastating loss that I do.

Dave Graham Memorial

A potluck memorial will be held 6-9 p.m. Saturday, May 31, in the library at Sanford & Son Auctions, 743 Broadway, Tacoma. Afterward, a tribute party featuring Dave's favorite bands - Deborah Page, masonapron and Bandolier - will be held at 9:30 p.m. at Stonegate Pizza, 5419 S. Tacoma Way.