This page is dedicated to providing information and updates concerning the status of my good friend and colleague, Marc Orchant.
As you know, Marc suffered a massive cardiac infarction on Sunday morning, December 2nd 2007. My original post is copied below.
Updates will be added to this page in reverse chronological order with the must current news at the top. If you have previously linked to the page at Blognation.com and have posted this story, please update your links as I no longer have access to that page and thus will be posting all news, updates and pertinent information here. Additionally, if you have previously posted a get well comment on the Blognation post, you might wish to duplicate that comment here as this is where people will be directed in the future. Thanks for your support.
Sue and the rest of the Orchant family have expressed their surprise and gratitude for the outpouring of support from the technology community. Although at this time they are not able to directly offer thanks for the continued prayers, well wishes, and warmth, they have asked me to thank you from the bottom of their hearts. Your words of encouragement, cards, flowers, and other gifts, but particularly the incredible love that people have shown towards Marc and his family have helped make this very difficult time somewhat less unbearable.
Update as of 4:14 AM Pacific Time, December 5th, 2007:
Editor’s Note: I just got off the phone with Sue Orchant and she has given the update below.
A Message from Sue Orchant
Hi everyone. I want you all to know that your amazing, incredibly overwhelming, heartfelt response of love, concern, and good wishes for Marc is helping myself, Rebecca, Jason and out family get through this difficult time.
Please keep sending those prayers and positive energy Marc’s way. He knows as well as I that you are all there for him. I’ll have to tell him that he’ll need to change his name to George Bailey (It’s a Wonderful Life). It’s a beautiful thing to see.
In this past day we have seen some baby steps of improvement. He has some response to stimuli and his oxygen levels and heart rate have improved. I am guardedly optimistic. He still has not regained consciousness but we will take things minute by minute.
It’s hard to put into words but I know you are all here with me and I appreciate you all. I will update you as soon as I know more.
Thank You.
Sue and the Orchant Family
Original Post
THIS IS NOT AN ATTEMPT AT HUMOR
- PLEASE REPOST
At some time between 7:30 and 8:10 AM on Sunday Morning December 2nd, 2007, Marc Orchant, my fellow author on this blog, as well as one of my closest friends sustained a massive heart attack while working in his home office. At this time Marc is in critical condition at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Critical Cardiac Care Unit, Bed 3. He is not expected to regain consciousness for the next 24 to 48 hours.
I was notified by Marc’s wife, Sue and asked to help notify Marc’s colleagues, friends and other business associates. Marc was scheduled to go to Seattle, WA as well as Ojai, CA this coming week. Obviously he will not be able to attend either event. Those of you that have association with either of Marc’s scheduled appearances at these locations, please notify those that require notice of this turn of events.
According to Sue Orchant, Marc was up early Sunday morning as is his normal custom. Sue told me that he was working in his office from about 7:30 AM until 8:10 when Sue says she heard a strange noise in Marc’s office. When she went to investigate she saw that Marc was not sitting in front of the computer like he normally does and was slumped over between his desk and a small couch that is in the room.
Initially, Sue said, she though he was leaning over doing something to their Golder Retriever but then she realized that he was not conscious. Fortunately, Sue has basic medical knowledge and after verifying that Marc was not choking and had a clear airway she began to perform CPR while their son, Jason, called paramedics.
The ambulance arrived in less than 10 minutes and technicians immediately took over performing CPR and administered treatment with a cardiac defibrillator. Marc was rushed into emergency open heart surgery where an angioplasty was performed to restore circulation in the blocked artery.
Sue went on to tell me that in spite of Marc’s apparent good health, he has severe occlusion in both his other arteries and they too will require treatment soon. That, however is a secondary concern as is the condition of Marc’s heart muscle. The primary concern and the question that cannot be answered until Marc regains consciousness is the nature or extent of any neurological damage as a result of insufficient oxygen reaching Marc’s brain.
While Marc still had what appeared to be normal color when Sue found him she is uncertain as to the exact time that Marc suffered the infarction. It is also unknown if Marc had stopped breathing or been without oxygen for any length of time prior to her discovery of the situation.
Currently Marc’s immediate family as well as his brothers and parents are in or on their way to Albuquerque to be with Marc. Sue has asked me to keep Marc’s colleagues and friends in the technology community updated as information becomes available. Please do not contact Sue for updates. I will publish any information that I have in multiple venues to keep people informed of any changes in Marc’s condition.
For those of you that wish to send flowers, cards, or other gifts, Marc is at:
Presbyterian Hospital
Cardiac Care Unit Bed #3
1100 Central Ave SE
Albuquerque, NM 87106
the hospital switchboard number is 505-841-1234.
My thoughts and prayers go out to Marc and his family in this difficult time. Marc is one of the finest human beings that I have ever had the good fortune to know and I pray that Marc makes a full and speedy recovery.
I am terribly sorry to hear of Marc’s passing. He will be missed.
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The power of the Internet can be liberating and it can be crushing. As some of you might do from time to time, I do Google searches on old colleagues, classmates, and long-ago acquaintances. Where are they now? I wonder what they are doing? I wonder if they have aged as gracelessly as I have?
I searched for Marc Orchant this morning, May 21 2016, and received this devastating news. Nearly nine years removed from his tragic passing, I am still incredibly saddened. I knew Marc a long time ago, in the late 1980’s, when I lived in Albuquerque. I had gotten this new-fangled thing called a Macintosh SE and had started a business doing some freelance writing and graphic production. I did a small job for the company Marc was working for at the time, and as I recall I learned more working with him than I had done in any working relationship up to that point.
He was brilliantly…well…brilliant. And utterly generous with his time and knowledge (and opinions!). One particular memory I still have of him is sitting in his little office talking pre-press, with his baby daughter Rebecca sleeping in her stroller right behind us. I have always remembered her name, and reading it again here is so bittersweet to me. Marc was glowing that day when he would turn and restore her pacifier, add some soothing coos, or just be the proud dad taking his daughter to work! His love for that little girl is something I often revisited as I raised my own years later.
I last talked to Marc in the early 2000’s, looking for some intel on a company I would be interviewing with. It had been a decade at that point since I had had my last contact with him, but that conversation…that one conversation…re-filled my tank like nothing else. Maybe that is the way it was with him. Those who knew him better and longer could say for sure. That he raised the level of those around him, that he improved our lot: that is probably the best legacy one could ever have, I’d say.
Hats off to you my old friend. You are not forgotten.