I want to send my deepest gratitude to all of my friends and family who reached out to us to send our family condolences. Your loving kindness will never be forgotten. I have never felt it more than in these past few years.
When our family found out that Erik had brain cancer it felt like it should be someone else’s nightmare. Fighting back tears becomes second nature. While desperately trying to uphold highest hopes there is a lead weight hanging right above your heart waiting to plunge it to bottom of the sea. I would imagine that this is true for so many people diagnosed with terminal illness. My heart goes out to ALL of you.
It’s only been a week and 3 days since Erik T. Cantine left this plain of existence.
I can still feel his energy and there have been so many little signs that let me know he’s listening.
The nurses told me that people will hang on sometimes experiencing excruciating pain. They said I needed to tell him it was ok to go. It was the last thing I ever wanted to say to him ... I wanted to keep fighting WITH him.
So - I told him that God most likely needed one of the best ice sculptors to keep hell out in a classy way. Then, I asked him to do all the hard work and leave some fun stuff for me.
That was one of the last smiles I saw on his handsome face.
When he finally decided to go, his family and friends had been visiting all day taking alone time to really talk with him. It was beautiful and sunny all day - right up until his final breath. Like something out of a movie, a storm rolled its bubbling black mass right above the hospice and the very first and most dynamic bolt of lightning cracked right above our heads.
What an epic mic drop of a moment for the beautiful adventure of a life well lived.
Erik asked me to write his eulogy. At the time, I didn’t take him seriously because I was expecting him to write mine.
We had travelled the world on a block of ice- competed in the US Olympics, raised our daughter separately but together by becoming even better friends and much better parents by putting our children first. He loved my second daughter like his own and made it a point to show them all the best experiences in life - after all, we were in charge of an opportunity to actually help make memories. Erik Cantine - nicknamed the “Can do kid” for a solid plethora of reasons could do ANYTHING.
I never wanted to believe there was anything bigger than him.
This is something that I wrote for his Celebration of Life service. I wrote it from my heart so it may not be a correct form of a eulogy - but my hope is that in sharing this it will inspire you to REALLY LIVE your own life because there is always more even in death, etc.
There’s only one Erik Cantine.
I’ve heard it said about us all. True as it may be some personalities seem to stand out more - make more waves. Their essence touches some part of us that makes them undeniably impactful in everything they do.
As we all gather here today to celebrate such a life of epic proportion, I do believe Erik would want nothing more than for us each to carry on in light of this energy he had. Reaching new pinnacles of humor, pushing the limits of love and waking the reality of just who each and every one of us truly are.
When I met Erik, I was at the end of a two-month tour of the island of Jamaica. He was carving ice for the anniversary celebration at one of the islands many popular resorts, and I was making the Tallo sculptures for the event. Like so many of us, meeting him for the first time took my breath away and I have never been the same since. That smile - and his laugh - he made the rest of the world disappear inside the adventure of the very moment we were in.
Erik Cantine - the can-do kid from Springdale, Pennsylvania had not only taken my heart by storm but was already well on his way to making his impact on the world around him.
He had a way of making everything look so easy. From his talent as a chef to his passion in ice sculpting Erik was what I would term a REAL celebrity.
No one else could promote him as well as his very own personality and impeccable taste for the very best in life.
There are people that shop for things that make them look good because of it being the right brand or the status quo… and then there are those that find the most unique piece of every human being they meet and make THAT into their “Gucci”.
This was Erik.
Yes, he was a world-renowned ice sculptor, a chef that made your mouth melt in ecstasy even if he had the bare minimum to work with and could rock the minds of any city planner or executive producer - of anything - with ideas that even the best of the best would never think of.
He will live in the hearts of future generations of Ocean City’s romantics touring the ice festival that will be dedicated in his name. Hi legacy will inspire the greatest of greats in the restaurants he has been so instrumental in creating from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania’s “Church Brew Works” to our beloved “Spain” overlooking the best sunsets over route 50 here in Ocean City, Maryland. I think we have all been blown away by this man and what just ONE of us can do in a lifetime. But I’m just not going to re-iterate the obvious.
THAT all my friends of Erik, was only the tip of the iceberg.
Because rarely in life do we ever come across someone who has the ability to show us what this life is worth to ourselves.
Erik Thomas Cantine will always live up to his initials. ETC… live life, etcetera- do anything etcetera…. There is ALWAYS more, but we must search for this within ourselves. To bring out the very best is just … what he did.
He was an amazing father making the most of the experience in life. This was always his priority.
So - as we celebrate the life so well lived by a man who only wanted to see the best that we could give this world let us remember his name in all we do.
With one SIMPLE phrase.
LIVE LIFE TO ITS FULLEST… ETC.