James Davis Lindahl

Biography:

On June 29, 1979, a star by the name of James Davis Lindahl was born. He would spend the next 47 years bringing laughter, joy, sarcasm, wit, but most of all, love—to the people and things he treasured.

Spending his early years in Europe, James developed a lifelong passion not just for playing with Legos, but for building Lego masterpieces. He was a builder in every sense of the word. Whether it was a predetermined set or a concoction of his own imagination, James never met a Lego he didn’t love—bonus points were awarded for Star Wars-related sets. He would spend hours, sometimes days, carefully constructing elaborate works piece-by-piece, bringing order, creativity, and imagination together in ways only he could. What he built was never just plastic bricks—it was a possibility made real.

James attended elementary and middle school in South Carolina and Florida, and high school in Boulder, Colorado. He went on to earn an undergraduate degree in Economics from the University of Colorado Boulder. More recently, he earned his Master of Business Administration (MBA) from American University in Washington, D.C., in 2020.
James’ professional life spanned many industries and roles. Whether volunteering as team captain for the Department of Justice (DOJ) Oilers softball team—where he wrote epic announcements and recaps of games gone by—working on Capitol Hill, tending bar, selling home products, shoes, or assisting with the management of shipping containers, James’ talents and skills were as varied as his personality. In every role, he was a builder of systems, teams, morale, and connections. Moreover, he was always willing to step in and go the extra mile to help his colleagues, many of whom James rightfully considered family.

A few of James’ many passions included cooking, music, and his precious kitty cats.
Indeed, James was a master chef—self-made, of course. There was not a meal too complicated for him to try. Cooking was one of the ways James showed love. Whether cooking at 2 a.m. for a friend in need or feeding the Sunday crew at Domestic Domestic, James loved developing delicious dishes (James is frowning right now, saying, "always avoid alliteration!") and bringing smiles to the faces of those he fed. In his own way, he built meals the same way he built everything else—with care, creativity, and a desire to comfort and bring people together.

Likewise, James was an avid music lover, inheriting 100% of all the musical talent and interest available between him and his twin. From a young age, James played the piano. If there was ever a piano or keyboard in the room, you could rest assured he would find it and ask to play. He could play songs by ear; music simply made sense to him, and he loved it. Classical, hard rock, jazz, ’80s and ’90s rock—James loved jamming out to all of it while dispensing a seemingly endless supply of random trivia he knew about a particular song, band, musician, or genre. He particularly loved a band he helped create, Space for Space, in the early 2010s - a bucket list item he helped nurture for several years.

And speaking of things James loved, he was a marvelous Cat Dad. Cats were always a special part of his life. From the time he was a baby, there was seemingly always a cat—or three—roaming around, and he loved them all deeply. He proudly wore T-shirts worshiping his four-legged angels, built elaborate cardboard-box fortresses, and dispensed treats with reckless abandon. Even with animals, James was a builder—constructing little worlds of comfort, play, and safety for the feline treasures he adored.

To know James was to love James. His quirky disposition, quick wit, dry sarcasm, generous heart, and uncanny ability to make you laugh no matter the circumstances are just a few of the memories we will carry with us always.
For his twin sister, James was more than a brother. He was the person who had been there from the very beginning—the other half of a story that started before either of them could remember. For 47 years, they shared a birthday, childhood, countless memories, laughter, arguments, inside jokes, adventures, and an impressive amount of sarcasm. They grew up, built separate lives, and traveled different roads, but there are some bonds that neither time nor distance can diminish.

The world is quieter without James. The piano bench is empty. There will be fewer obscure facts offered without solicitation, fewer perfectly timed sarcastic remarks, fewer elaborate meals prepared simply because someone he loved was hungry.

There is no way to adequately measure what is lost when someone like James leaves this world. But neither can we adequately measure everything he left behind—in the people he made laugh, the friends he fed, the animals he loved, the music he played, the memories he created, and the lives he helped build simply by being in them.
Forty-seven years was nowhere near enough, but what a gift it was to have him for every one of them.
Rest in peace, Sweet Baby James. You are loved beyond measure, missed beyond words, and will never be forgotten.

“Think of me, think of me fondly.”
—The Phantom of the Opera

James leaves behind his parents, Tom and Miriam (Boulder, CO), brother Edward (Atlanta, GA), and twin-sister Susan (Sarasota, FL). If you would like to make a charitable donation in James' honor, the family asks that you consider a local charity of your choice.

James Davis Lindahl

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