Phillip Rawlings, Jr

Kara McQueen-Borden Phillip laughing is definitely the main image that comes to mind of him from all those years at MA. Phillip laughing, and Phillip listening to music (pretty sure he has on a Jupiter Coyote shirt here, fittingly). Listening to music, for sure, but if he was in charge of the stereo, never – never – listening to a single song the whole way through to the end. Growing up in our tiny class over all those years could feel like going to school with a bunch of cousins sometimes, and to this day some of those friendships feel more like family than anything else, even over distance and time. But even after all those years and all that growing up we did together, I couldn’t come up with a single bad thing to say about Phillip if I tried. He put a whole lot of goodness and light into the world, and I am proud and lucky to have known him.

Charles Mandell One of the many things I loved about Phillip was his sense of wonder and adventure. In addition to being incredibly reliable and equally positive, he had a keen and curious intellect, which made him a really great traveling companion. At age 20, he lived and studied in England, fully immersing himself in the British university experience. That winter, we backpacked Spain together. I was a total greenhorn traveller, and managed to get robbed within 20 minutes of arriving in Barcelona. Phillip, meanwhile, had researched and came prepared for everything, had pinpointed all the must-see places to visit: Grenada, Seville, Madrid, Barcelona. Even at 20, he was a seasoned traveller, confident and clear. A few years later, while in med school, he worked a summer in Zambia, serving a local community as a medic. Fresh off that trip, he flew out to Wyoming to visit me while I was working there. The area was a great jumping off place for trekking in the Rockies, and I have great memories of us climbing the Medicine Bow peaks near Encampment. He was steady, and reliable, through and through. Great sense of humor, and one of the best laughs I've ever known. I am incredibly fortunate that I got to be your friend, Phillip. You will stay with me in my heart as long as I live.

William Moretz Great times in college/west coast road trip! Will miss you brother

Cammie Hill-Prewitt I don't think my memory goes back to a time before Phillip. I was barely five years old when we starting riding carpool in Kindergarten - riding five across the backseat of Gloria's woody wagon, leaning out the window of my mom's car belting Muppet Christmas Carols, getting Slurpies from the 7Eleven on Carter Hill on the way TO school the day my dad's odometer went back around to zero. Speaking of cars, once we turned 16 I remember riding his TBird with the portholes and yes Kara, that he would never, ever let a song finish before being so excited to start the next one. I remember sitting behind him in math class in one of those moments when the teacher leaves the room and it erupts in chaos and he slid his glasses down his nose and rapped all of Snow's Informer. I remember meeting up with him in London when I was studying abroad and him being super annoyed with me while I haggled over some sweet platform shoes at a street market. I remember going camping with him and Charlie and Ryan in Big Sur and what we DIDN'T remember were the tents and we all slept like a big pile of puppies while listening to what we were pretty, hopefully sure was raccoons and not bears eating all our food. I remember his love of photography and the beautiful photos from his travels that he gave us as a wedding present. I remember a long and winding talk at Charlie and Marissa's rehearsal dinner when I was so pregnant I couldn't see my toes and how he looked out for me the whole weekend. I will always remember him as joyful, earnest, excited, curious and kind. Miss you Phillip!

William Culpepper In reading all of the entries on this page, everyone has done such a great job capturing the essence of the Phillip Rawlings I remember - kind-hearted, fun-loving, positive, smart, selfless, lover of music w/ an itchy trigger finger, fast walker, big laugh, big smile. My memories of Phillip start in 1st / 2nd grade - I remember spending the night at his house on Lebron Ave, playing soccer games at Maxwell AFB on Saturday mornings, then driving to Auburn games. We watched the Tigers and combed the stands after games collecting empty souvenir cups to bring home. Phillip and I were in the minority as Auburn fans, which helped forge an early bond between us. To this day, I think I have been to more Auburn games with the Rawlings family than anyone else. When we got to middle school, Phillip started playing football, and he served as the scout team tailback. I did not play football, but I remember he would come to school with huge purple and yellow bruises up and down his arms after taking hits from upperclassmen. Seeing the bruises, I was like, "holy #$*", but Phillip never complained. He was a tough dude. In high school, Phillip was someone that everyone wanted to be around. All of our parents loved him, too. A surefire way to stave off an interrogation by my parents about my plans for the night was to say, “I’m going with Phillip.” That always eased their minds, but I might leave off the part about, “We’re going to see if the T-bird will hit 100 on the way back from the Horde Festival.” But seriously, my parents were a good judge of character, and they were absolutely right to admire Phillip. As Kara referenced, I can’t think of a bad thing to say about Phillip. He was a great friend, and his parents did an exceptional job raising him. I hurt for his family and friends right now, and I hope and pray for peace and comfort for all who knew and loved him.

Lesesne Hamilton I have so many memories of Phillip, it is hard to write them all down. I remember going to Auburn football games with his family. Philip walking so fast that I could barely keep up with him. Phillip had boundless energy. I remember listening to music in the T-Bird, in my car, or any car with Phillip for usually about three quarters of a song, and then it was off to the next song. Phillip was always the car DJ. I remember when he hurt his knee and his friends went to go see him at the hospital. We were there to cheer him up, but he just cheered us up telling us stories about his nurses, and catheters, and stuff that is not appropriate for this page. That was just Phil. Always fun-loving; always cheering people up. I remember us driving down to Pensacola to help my aunt, a single mother with two kids, clean up after Hurricane Irene. Two teenagers with chainsaws, a generator, and Phillips boundless energy. We slept on a tile floor because the heat and humidity was so oppressive; it was the only way we could cool down. We weren’t getting paid and didn’t matter. Phillip was selfless. If a friend needed help; if a friend’s family member needed help, Phil was there. I remember going to visit him after he moved to Mobile. The staff at his medical practice loved him. Phillip was dedicated to his patients, and it was obvious. He was my father’s doctor and it was his dedication to my father, as one his patients, that led to the catching of the cancer in my father’s lung at a very early stage. I remember hanging out with him at Charlie’s wedding. He was typical Phillip; boundless energy, smiling, laughing, having fun, up for anything. He was such a good person, good friend, and one of kind. I feel so blessed to have had Phillip be a part of my life. He will be so missed.

Keith Brown Phillip always had a mind of his own. I remember him having a Bianchi bike while the rest of us had Specialized or Treks. He like Michigan basketball. Michigan?! Liked the Fab 5, which I thought was ridiculous but I didn’t really care, but I would give him grief about it relentlessly because it was fun to watch him get riled up. He’s the only one I’ve maybe ever met who starts to laugh at the end of trying to make a point arguing with you. He wore the number 2 in high school because he liked Rohan Marley of Miami. I think he liked the way Rohan tackled. Go figure. We made it on the Pat Dye tv show one time after a big Auburn win because we hung around the gates after the game and just walked into the locker room asking for gloves and whatever else. We basically laughed at each other, dumbfounded we made it in. I think Phil may have told someone we were with the press. We might have been 13. I remember spending the night at his house in 3rd grade...maybe one of my first sleepovers. Neither of us shut up most the night and their dog Prissy kept coming in yapping which was fun to watch him navigate handling that dog. One time in grad school both of us in Birmingham, I went to his house off of Valley Ave. Across the street was the entrance to a place called “The Club” which is this old Birmingham venue on top of one of Birmingham’s “mountains”. He told me he wanted to go on a hike and we took off across the street and at the entrance to The Club he took a hard left into what is basically woods. I asked where we were going and he said don’t worry about it so I followed and we ended up on top of the mountain in the middle of woods all around us looking out over downtown. What a vantage point. I’m not surprised he figured that path out! I saw Phillip last a few years back and he was great as ever. We visited over lunch with my wife and he asked about our boys incessantly and was just a pleasure as always. Love you Phillip. You’ll be a part of us forever.

Robert Brown This picture of Phillip with Jey during our senior cruise sums up mine and so many others memories of Phillip…big smile and a big heart. I have great memories of sleepovers on LeBron with Prissy as well. We always made pizzas for dinner and I remember Gloria questioning her parental skills as we convinced her to let us rent Bloodsport. I have to throw in a pic of our summer mowing gig be/c it was some of the best money we made. Partnering with Phillip was a sure thing; he was always a hard worker. I have vivid memories of the T-Bird and Phil’s DJ skills (he wore out Pearl Jam and Blind Melon). He loved sports and was one of just a few of us who played baseball. He loved Ricky Henderson and the Bash Brothers; he was a monster fan of Bo Jackson (as we all were, but he was a bigger fan be/c he rooted for AU). He loved reggae music and had an awesome Bob Marley poster on his wall. He was the first of our friends to introduce us to Eric Clapton (via Cream)…much appreciated as I was listening to Poison. He was the most talented artist of our friends and certainly the smartest. Above all, he was a best friend. We love and miss you Phillip! You’ll always be with us.

Tabor Novak When I think back to all my great memories from high school, Phillip is a huge part of most of them. There are several themes developing in reading all these posts, but the thing that stands out in my mind about Phil is his laugh. He had a tremendous laugh, the kind of laugh that would make other people laugh just hearing it, regardless of whether what was said was actually funny. I loved our times just riding around in the T-Bird, with Phil bouncing and pounding the steering wheel and turning the music up at every red light. I loved talking to Phil because in addition to being able to cut loose and have fun, he was exceptionally intelligent and always had something to say that I wasn't necessarily thinking about as a teenager. In addition to his intelligence, Phil was fiercely driven, two traits that not many of us are lucky enough to possess. His greatest quality, however, was that Phillip Rawlings had a huge heart. I have vivid memories from the Culpepper's lake house and our beach trips, and when I think of Phil during those times, it makes me smile because every time Phillip walked into a room, the mood of the room immediately changed for the better. We had an irreparable disagreement over his love for Auburn and we got into some pretty heated discussions about it; other than that and my giving him a very hard time about an ill-timed comment he made to a waitress at a Destin restaurant about our age in 1994, Phillip and I just clicked. Phillip was a great friend, and I feel extremely fortunate to have known him. TADOW, old friend, I will miss you. -Tabor Novak

Katie Shute My childhood is filled with memories of Phillip when our families would get together- Lake Martin weekends, Busch Garden trips, football games, and Friday night Pictionary at the Rawlings’ house. As we continued to grow up, he was always looking out for me, like a brother. One of the last times I remember spending quality time with Phillip was at Charlie and Marissa’s wedding in San Francisco. I sat next to him at their formal wedding reception and half-way through the seated dinner, he ran upstairs to his hotel room without explanation only to come back down sporting his snake skin cowboy boots. “NOW, I’m comfortable!” he said through his laughter. We laughed and laughed that entire night. I loved hearing stories about his travels and about his family medical practice. Jesse and I had been married about 2 years prior and Dr. Phil was determined for us to start trying to have children, concerned that my “biological clock” was ticking and would be running out of time shortly. By the time he left town that weekend, he had armed me with an entire arsenal of vitamins and supplements to get the ball rolling. I will always remember Phillip's heart of gold, constant smile and pausing mid-sentence to break out in laugher while telling a story. He was always super positive and so uplifting to be around. I will miss him dearly.