Short obituary

William “Bill” Wayne Bash, age 64, of Indianapolis, passed away December 14, 2022.  He had a long, difficult battle with several disease processes in the end but he is finally at rest. He is survived by his sister Elaine Bash Smith. Bill grew up in Indy where he attended Northwest High School, Ball State University, and his career took him around the world. He lived mostly on the west side, where he enjoyed live music, live pro sports (especially IndyCar), and socializing with friends and family. Bill may have had some struggles, but he lived life to the fullest, and he would do anything for his friends, family, or community. Bill made everyone who knew him laugh, cry, and stand amazed at all the stories he shared. But everyone is grateful to know that Bill is finally at peace. No services will be held other than a small wake at [location] on [date] at [time], all are welcome.

---------------------------------------

Short eulogy

To start, you’ll have to forgive me because I’ve never done this before, so feel free to zone out for only a few minutes starting now.  And I don’t like to self-promote, that’s not my style.  But I wanted to talk about Bill, and since our lives were intertwined in many ways for a long time, I thought you might enjoy the memories.  Shoot, many of you have the same memories! I know a lot of you have even earlier memories of Bill, but he and I went back to January of 1966, our second semester of the 2nd grade and I had transferred from Lafayette, Indiana.  I’d say there was frequent fun and relative destruction.

The FF&RD was as early as one night (we were in the 3rd grade) when I was sleeping over at Bill’s and the bouncing on the bed got a little carried away…to the point that I bounced into his bedroom window and broke the glass - oh, oh, we can’t hide this one!  Does anyone remember the 4th grade when several of the boys would wear everything blue on Thursdays including blue dickies?!  Then we were in a special class starting in the 5th grade so we went to a different school, but the FF&RD continued.  One basketball season our class had a team, Duvalle’s Devils that was named after our teacher; we didn’t have enough boys in the class so some of the girls really stepped up in this all-boy league.  On the sad side, Bill greeted me one Monday morning saying his trumpet-playing days were over, then I noticed his front teeth were traumatically missing due to a neighborhood baseball game accident.  Another day after school we were waiting by a restaurant for the city bus and a bigger boy on the outside of a glass door was holding the door and keeping us from catching our bus, so Bill backed up for a running start and, you guessed it, the door and Bill’s future allowances were shattered.  But Scouts were coming along now so we’d really be rounded, right?  Well, you would have your doubts if 1) you saw Bill and I fixing Chef Boy-Ar-Dee spaghetti over a Bunson burner, forgetting to add any water, and 2) Bill and his mom Sandy fighting over the unmanned steering wheel on the highway to camping weekends!

Junior high continued to be special with the same class and the field trips were really adventurous.  But let’s not forget about the line drive to a classmate playing 3rd base that hit him…well, we’ll just say he dropped understandably like a Sycamore but the gym coach wanted to “…get on with the game!” Guys, you know what I mean.

High school, well we have to be a bit more discreet in our recollections here now.  Oh, Bill was so involved not only in his academics but in his extracurricular groups at school as well.  Here, Bill and I also worked at a pizza place and I have to reveal our secret.  Don’t tell anybody, okay?  Anytime an NHS letterman came in that we didn’t like, they’d get anchovy juice ever so slightly on their pizza!  Again, both of us were very busy and our college choices didn’t match, but we continued to stay in touch given our history.  Did he like concerts?  Oh, don’t tell me you had to think about it.  Bill began traveling then and, once he was in the working world, he traveled to all, and I mean all corners of the earth.  Just wondering, did he ever count with you how many places he lived?  The number would be impressive.

Bill continued a very successful business career; we all did.  But, possibly due to his financial success, he could have made some better decisions (not to say I live in a glass house whatsoever).  Sadly, it was too long between get-togethers but Bill and I had other priorities through much of our working career, and I’m sure neither he nor I have regrets.  When work slowed down, we got more in touch thanks to his backyard pool he wanted us all to enjoy, and he had no problem persuading me to join him in IndyCar-everything (news, practice, qualifying, racing) - yep, not a problem since it’d been in our blood all.our.lives.

Look, it is no secret to admit that his health issues were a direct result of poor decisions; he always owned that.  And I’m not saying that, when it came to crucial conversations, he wasn’t a bear.  I’m not here to judge destruction anymore.  I am here to remember the fun, the laughs (oh, he had the longest, breath-emptying laugh), the amazement at how intelligent Bill was.  He kept current with the issues and he had a platform, frankly.  He loved live concerts and live pro sports.  He loved cars with manual transmissions.  He loved gardening, and he loved bowling with his dad Connie.  He actually loved it, believe it or not, when his mom Sandy would surprise him with a prank or two.  He loved his foster dogs; they were his children and he poured his heart out for them - so many of them.  And you know what?  He loved his sister Elaine.  Look at those old black and white photos and tell me those two aren’t grinning ear to ear.  And I don’t remember them fighting like most young siblings did.  Unfortunately, as adults there were some hurtful arguments between them and I’d bet that we could blame Bill.  But Elaine will tell you that there were no grudges in the end because through all of his 64 years, deep down he always loved his sister.  And he loved us.  Oh, he was so caring and so giving.  I remember watching with Bill a couple times the old made-for-TV-movie The Brian Piccolo Story.  Even we had tears during the closing scene when Gale Sayers was speaking about his friend and teammate Brian Piccolo who’d just died of cancer at the age of 26, so I think I can paraphrase it slightly for it to apply to Bill.  He leaves a great many loving friends who miss him and think of him often.  But when you think of him, it’s not how Bill died that you’ll remember - but how he lived.  How he did live!  I love you, Bill.  And I know you love him too.  So tonight, when you hit your knees, please ask God to love him.  And would you join me now with The Lord’s Prayer?

-- posted with permission by Steve Banton