In my short life, four people have died who continue to haunt my memories.

My grandfather died when I was 18 and stationed at Loring AFB in Maine. I remember a year or so later visiting my grandmother’s house and going through his garage and looking at all his mechanic tools, and being haunted by his presence.

During college, my girlfriend’s sister died in a flash flood. I cried at that funeral. I never understood why. I barely knew her. The one thing I remember is that she said I was a “good egg.”

I’ve blogged about Buddy Blue a few times. He wasn’t my closest friend, but he was a friend, and he never got his due as a songwriter and musician. I loved our e-mail exchanges about music. I still miss him. During a recent trip to Orlando, his version of “St. James Infirmary” popped up on my iPod. I listened to it about 15 times. I’ll take his version of that classic over any other, including Cab Calloway, any time.

And Eric Show.

Eric Show was a pitcher for the San Diego Padres. After he was quoted making some especially insulting statement about Alan Wiggins and Tony Gwynn, I wrote him an angry letter (I was in my second year at Point Loma Nazarene College). Eric answered. We exchanged a few more letters. Then we met for lunch. And more letters. Then I stopped by his guitar shop one time and we went for lunch again. We talked on the phone maybe twice.

With that minimal contact, I still considered him a friend.

Then one evening, while watching Star Trek, Channel 51 teased their 10 o’clock news … the announcer said something like, “Padres pitcher found dead,” and the video was of Show, whom I recognized instantly. I burst into tears. It was such a shock.

Show was an interesting and complex person. He was often misunderstood and hence, terribly controversial. I still think most fans, those who even remember him, have a negative perspective on the man. To me, he remains a man to admire. He was an intellectual with varied interest and high ideals.

These thoughts come to me because of a profile of the man on SignOnSanDiego written by Brent Schrotenboer. It’s the best piece about him since a San Diego Reader profile a decade or so ago (Show told me he hated that piece, but it was pretty good).

Related to Schrotenbore’s article is a conversation I had with Show — a very religious man — that has always stuck with me …. Show was convinced he was haunted by demons. And I don’t mean the mental or psychological demons some of us may feel we face from time to time, but real devils out to destroy him. If Show was right, if as Paul preached, there are physical demons out to destroy whatever is good in the world, then that is what took Eric’s life — not drugs … but spiritual powers he could not, for some reason, even with all his faith and prayer, conqueror.

We all have our demons. I just think Eric’s were more real than most. And that is what makes the man such a mystery more than a decade after his death.

Eric Show’s music isn’t available through Amazon, but here’s a record by his former teammate: Tim Flannery & the Enablers