It’s with a very saddened and heavy heart as I write this and speak this that I share that a friend of mine, Ryan Geist Bozajin has passed away. He was 39 years old.
Ryan is someone who I had known since late college, having attended the same university I did, and with us both having worked in similar fields, as he was one of very few people whose career track was extremely similar to my own. With both of us having extensive production experience as well as on set supervision experience in regards to various capacities in film and commercial post-production work.
He and I had collaborated together in several capacities, first meeting on a mutual friend’s ridiculously beyond goofy project, a condom commercial called Space Jizz. Yes, read into that title just as you’d like. It’s not up front and center on the filmmaking resume with Transmutation, and to my knowledge has to this day never been completed, but I have shot a commercial called Space Jizz. As it was exactly what you might think. A raunchy spec ad involving semen floating through zero gravity in a spaceship. It was a single day green screen shoot which I was the director of photography on with Ryan being the Visual Effects Supervisor. It was a super fun project which we worked on as a group of college friends. We later worked once each together at a small Lucasfilm subcontractor as well as an augmented reality company in San Francisco which he and I have both been members of.
He and I not only jived on professional and work related wavelengths but he is especially relevant to my personal work because he himself was on episode 15 of the podcast as well in the early Novelty Generators days. Which to my knowledge was the first time he’d ever spoken publicly about some of his more obscure interests. Which I pride myself on having done numerous times. Pulling people out of the intellectual closet that is. So very sadly, he is now the first guest from the podcast who has passed away.
His LLC RGB Media, and small production company was a contributing factor to the second episode of our documentary series Shamans of the Global Village as well. RGB Media, which stood for Ryan Geist Bozajian Media (which was also surely a play on the common post production color dynamic of Red, Green, and Blue) being in the front credits for the episode.
The circumstances surrounding his death are a bit uncertain and may very well always remain that way. As it was from a car accident near Mt. Shasta and he was driving very late at night alone. To make this a bit sadly synchronistic, while writing this I listened to another recording of him in conversation in which he referenced Andy Weir’s story story The Egg. “The opening line of which read, You were on your way home when you died. It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless.”
Death is part of life. Not an end. But a reboot. But the saddest part of death in this life, especially young death, is the time lost from what you would have gotten to spend together. That’s certainly the saddest part of having a child pass away young for example. As they would have had so much time still left in the hour glass than an old timer would.
While Ryan was in the material realm he loved many things. One was Ken Wilber and philosophical word salads. Another was the work of Stanley Kubrick. Biggest Kubrick fan I’d ever met. We had many conversations about the master filmmaker and his works. Another thing he loved was being a socialite. Ryan was a social butterfly to say the least. He knew practically everyone. He wasn't the type of guy that I could tell you would do the thing directly, but what he could do is connect you up with 10 people each of which would be a perfect match to help you with steps along the way in order to accomplish the task. He’s the type of employee a company would bring on board because of their personal rolodex. Thus, Facebook was an often used tool in his arsenal. He was one of those dudes who used it a great deal. Not solely as his only tool of communication but more as an initial vector for physical meet up.
After his passing, there has been a deluge of Boz’s friends and acquaintances posting about him on his page there. With a private group regarding him created as well. Which also very wonderfully put together a group memorial ceremony for him. A silver lining of memorials is they bring folks together who may not have otherwise met around the nucleus of the one who has passed away. Just like the life of a great star, all things must come to an end, and digital pages that cease to be maintained tend to eventually fizzle out in the near future. Those types of things are initially something like that of a high school yearbook, where folks will swing in, leave a thought felt remark and then move on with their own lives. But this page, will continue sitting there in 1’s and 0’s. His old posts will continue to be there. As though they were now left by some kind of ghost.
This is a strange factor now upon us in the age of people sharing their activities on whatever series of interconnected blogs they choose to upload their tid bits to. It is weird enough if the ghost posted sporadically and you, having looked at their back posts after their passing, get a very sporadic glimpse into their thought processes and activities. Yet it’s high strangeness if the ghost was a daily poster, because then suddenly, their frequent data stream just hard stops.
There was a story of young man who was up in a cherry bucket on a very windy day. I don’t recall the context of what he was doing but do recall he was Tweeting updates from his phone while up there. Including saying things like “geez these winds are crazy strong” just moments before the bucket blew over and toppled resulting in him dying from the fall.
Another college friend of mine who had passed away, from diabetes nonetheless, a skinny guy who I distinctly remember eating nothing but McDonalds constantly during those collegiate years, continues to have a three plus year old cobweb covered Facebook page which seems like it will always continue to be there even though he’s left his meat suit and can’t keyboard mudra onto it any longer. Unless a family member somehow knew his password who could then go and delete it if they felt the need. Instead, the page now has a banner at the top of it giving notice that it’s now archived as a memorialized account. Which when visiting feels a bit like you’re inside the funeral home or tombstone in cyberspace.
Carl Ruiz was a quite known somewhat famous celebrity chef, who died of a heart attack in 2019 at 44 from clogged arteries. He was a prolific and frequent poster on Twitter where many of his updates there were of course food related. Often showing pictures of food which no human being should be eating - Such as hot dogs, donuts, triple factory farmed cheese burgers, cans of sweetened tea, and you get the picture. A post right before his passing reads “Absolutely perfect hand cut french fries in homemade gravy. Be still my cold dead black heart”. So he basically was documenting his demise and the baby step record is out there.
The comedian Ducan Trussell, whose one of those gaggle of funny guys in LA who have all become more well known by orbiting around another comedian who also happens to be the world’s most famous podcaster, had this amazing and somewhat now legendary episode of his podcast Ducan Trussell’s Family Hour where he had his dying mother on just a very short time before her passing. I remember listening to the episode when it came out and it’s stuck with me years later now. It has actually subsequently been adapted into the final episode of a Netflix show he co-created called The Midnight Gospel. Which speaks quite philosophically regarding the topic of death.
His mother had an incredible maturity about her certain imminent passing. Claiming she felt most alive before her physical death. She had completely decoupled from suffering by letting go and having complete acceptance of her passing. Even suggesting a turning toward death. Saying it’s not going to hurt you and that it’s a tremendous teacher. Her having been a psychologist, and lily a good one, really showed. And you could tell by her powerful near final words, that she was a very special lady. So the ghost of her will always live in a documented way through I’m sure numerous private family channels and memories as well as that public conversation.
While it seems to be the style of many to post on someone’s wall after their passing, spending time leaving what is a very here today gone tomorrow ephemeral drop in the ocean, then moving on with their own lives, it’s much more the style of this writer and narrator to put together this essay regarding, as something that will hopefully be more long lasting and a bit more of a time capsule.
Modernity in the Western World has such a terror of death. Knowing my parents are at their age where any day now, either of them could go. Hopefully they have another good decade in them, yet at their state each day later in life should be thought of as a gift for sure.
While Ryan had much of a life off social media and many people knew him at surface level, his real life, was never fully known to many. Just as many men never really disclose their intimate thoughts to one another in conversation, as it’s generally a constant to say you’re doing fine even when you have many hardships and mishaps going on in your life below the surface. Much of which you feel as though you can’t talk to many of your acquaintances about. This is something I will on occasion say to someone who is consulting with me about themselves. As it’s so important to have friends or acquaintances you can talk to about what’s really going on in your real life.
So however Ryan went out. Whatever his state of mind and heart right toward the end. Even though there are no coincidences and everything happens for a reason, it’s hard to really concritize that when someone shuffles off what may be their mortal coil suddenly. And early. Why would Ryan chose to go or want to go if that is the case? Very hard not to feel deep sadness when I think that if I could go back and tell Ryan he would not live to see his 40th birthday. I do wish I knew all the details about what was happening in his life. Although, like many of us, there was some shadow there, and I will say that in the last half dozen or so encounters with Ryan, our conversations were increasingly strange, the light and bright side of him will be missed. His personality. His humor, his fun, his winning smile. His radiance. The good times we had together with circles of mutual friends. And much more. You were always so kind to me brother. You are said to have put the Meta in the Metaverse. Much love and until we meet again.