Tim Doughtie | Share the Love...

Dear friends,

This site is dedicated to Tim Doughtie and his family. We are collecting stories and pictures of your experiences with this remarkable man to share with other friends.

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Matt Doughtie

Grace Doughtie

Collins Doughtie

The Memorial Service for Tim Doughtie
A Meditation by John M. Miller

Phil Porter | Photos from Phil

Maggie Rojas Westbury

Jennifer Asnip Quattlebaum

Howard J. Rankin, PhD

A few weeks ago I came across Tim leaving Harris-Teeter. He told me that he had recently seen his neighbor, a fellow professional of mine, Dr Bryant Welch. And with that typical glint in his eye and an almost perceptible smile breaking out across his face, Tim said, in earnest expression and his incomparable rich vocal timbre, “He’s so much smarter than you are.”

Bryant is a Harvard educated professional lawyer and clinical psychologist so Tim was probably right. What makes this funny and essentially Tim was his uncanny ability to deliver an unexpected statement that violated all the social norms and yet do so in a loving and compassionate way. In many ways, Tim was the perfect antidote to the scourge of political correctness.

As a psychologist there are times when one needs a little therapy of one’s own. Tim was my therapist. When I just needed a change of pace, to step outside the world of troubles, I’d call my very own stress buster. We’d have lunch and enjoy an hour or so of jocular jousting, testing each other with our own improbable stories. To see a smile break out on his face was to be infected with that same joy and delight. One lunch with Tim was good for a three month spiritual tune-up. By his own example, he ignited the joy, humor and compassion that lay often all too hidden from within us. He reconnected us with the virtues that are all important but which so often get buried under the burdens of everyday obligations. Tim was a man with the right priorities.

In between our “therapy” sessions, I would periodically e-mail Tim a High Cotton idea, which he would always treat with respect, encouragement and sage advice as to why it wasn’t commercially viable. More recently I sent him an idea for a line of greeting cards. At first it seemed that this had promise but ultimately he told me why it wouldn’t work. I wrote him an e-mail in mock indignation, blaming his savage rejection on my need to retreat to Gstaad for convalescence and asking him quite pointedly for Hallmark’s telephone number. When, untypically, I got no reply I thought that he might have actually taken me seriously. I wish that had been the reason for his silence. When he got back to me he told me he was in the early stages of diagnosis.

When he revealed to me his diagnosis in an e-mail, I was devastated. I knew what it meant. If there was anything – absolutely anything -- I could have done to save my friend, I would have done it. I wrote him that and I hope he knew I had never been more sincere.

It is inexplicable, of course, as to why Tim was taken from us so soon. It was always going to be too soon even if he’d lived to be 120. The only answer that makes sense to me is that he was needed elsewhere. People like Tim are needed everywhere. There simply aren’t enough of them. Or any of them quite like Tim.

Heaven is surely a better place right now even as we are worse off without him. Tim’s probably already played a practical joke or two on St. Peter. Perhaps he’s sneakily stuck a note on the Pearly Gates that says something like, “Please speak up, St. Peter’s hard of hearing.”

Tim was the embodiment of the joy of the human spirit. He was the conduit of that joy, transmitting it to us through humor and compassion. I don’t know about you, but whenever I smile or laugh there will be part of me that will think of Tim and forever be grateful that he was part of my life.