Silent Key VE3QF

I've never known much about amateur radio, but the little I do know has always interested me. Whenever I think about it, it's with a feeling that if I'd been born one generation earlier it would have been something I'd have been into. My existing penchant for chat, on IRC and now more modern alternatives, is easily interpretable as a leaning towards communication with new and interesting people in exotic places all over the world, and amateur radio was always the best - indeed only - way to do this in the years before the Internet.

I've never known much about the man who I liked to think of as my father-in-law, but the little I do know has always interested me. Whenever I think about him, it's with a feeling that if I'd been able to spend more time with  him, through an imagined combination of meeting Nikki earlier and living closer than 3,000 miles away, he would have been someone I'd have got along with really well, what with our shared background in computing, our tendency to geekiness, the chat thing, ...

But now, after one of those traumatic late evening phone calls and a poignant Facebook status update, I'll never have that chance. "Silent Key VE3QF" was Paul's brief message, and although I knew the background to it, knew that VE3QF was Tony's call sign and I could work out what "silent key" meant, I still looked it up. What I found was a clear explanation of a simple yet profound message for the amateur radio community that I found unexpectedly moving.

Part of the explanation reads: You may hear a silent key referred to as an SK in Morse Code, although "SK" can also signal "end transmission."

End transmission. What a perfect expression for any geek at the end of their life, especially one steeped in the lore of the amateur radio enthusiast and who had a well-developed appreciation of irony. Sleep well Tony.