Page 31 - Demo

The Nevada Traverse Vol.51, No.3, 2024 29Rusty and I worked together for 18 of the last 21 years through 4 different companies and that is not by coincidence. Rusty loved the movie Talladega Nights, he even named one of his dogs Ricky Bobby (Rusty. LOVED dogs). At work we would refer to each other as being %u201cShake and Bake%u201d. If you haven%u2019t guessed by now, this guy was an integral part of my day-to-day life!! So how the fuck can he be gone so suddenly? How can he leave me like a one-night stand after all we%u2019ve been through? And now that he is gone, how do I honor someone that meant so much to me? How do I say thank you for having my back through it all. How do I say, %u201cYou%u2019re my boy Blue!%u201d or %u201cI love you, Bro%u201d one last time%u2026 Rusty leaves behind his mother Valerie Hickerson, his sister Debbie Thelin (husband Jace), nieces and nephews Maya, Ashton, Stevie & Caden, and his %u201cwolf pack%u201d Ricky Bobby, Bella, and Bozeman. Thoughts from Carl R. C.de Baca, PLS:Rusty (Kelly) Combest, Rest in PeaceThere are enough stories about Rusty to fill up an Open Mic night at the Improv. Some of those are even surveying related (but none of the really good ones%u2026)! I am not going to reveal any of those stories here. They are the kind you tell when hanging with a group of surveyors that knew him and some cold libations, if you understand what I mean. Rusty walked through life following his own path and he didn%u2019t really listen to advice or suggestions about which way he should go. But that individuality, sometimes seemingly just for the sake of being individualistic, generally worked for him and if he had regrets, they were never on display.I hired Rusty, a young Oregon Tech graduate and Navy Veteran, and moved him to Sacramento, away from his cherished Nevada, initially as a favor to his stepdad and mentor, my friend Barry Hickerson. Barry had sold TriState and knew Rusty wouldn%u2019t likely enjoy the new regime there, so he caught me at the bar during a NALS conference and made the pitch. My company was growing fast and a Survey grad with a recommendation from Barry sounded good to me. Rusty and I went out the next night, got drunk and sealed a deal for him to come apprentice in Sacramento for a couple years. He really didn%u2019t want to leave Nevada but Barry had sold him on me the way he sold me on Rusty. That guy was the consummate salesman, but that is topic for another time.Over the next four years, Rusty, (no one ever called him Kelly, except for our eccentric buddy Spike), developed the solid surveying and mapping skills that he used for the rest of life to good effect. During that time we became good friends and stayed in touch over the years. While in Sacramento, Rusty constantly heard the call of the wild, as we Nevadans typically do when our careers take us away, and eventually he could resist no more and came home to the desert and mountains. Hunting, and especially hunting with Barry, was his one consuming passion and they had some great years stalking and taking down big game in Nevada and elsewhere. His stepdad was his best friend. Once he returned to Reno he became a fixture of surveying and mapping in Northern Nevada.Rusty was stubborn, inflexible, maybe drank a little too much, and was a damn good surveyor. Barry was proud of him and so am I. He had heart of gold and would never turn his back on a friend. And he died way too young. I%u2019ll miss him for a long time and every time I%u2019m out in the desert I%u2019ll wonder if he and his best friend might be stalking an antelope just over the next hill.Thoughts from Mitch Bartorelli:To know Rusty was to love him, even when he was making you mad. I met Rusty in 1997, we were coworkers and had a mutual bond over being fans of the San Diego Chargers, he was stationed there with the Navy for a while. However our real connection came over the love of waterskiing, he found out I had a ski boat and asked if I wanted to go help him survey in a fixed buoy slalom course at Eagle Lake, I ran the gun from shore and he dove down under the water to move the anchor blocks to the correct locations by hand, Navy training. We tuned up the course and spent the rest of the weekend skiing it and then the rest of the summer at Lahontan. That is when I found out that Rusty was not only a good surveyor but was also an exceptional athlete, he could waterski and barefoot as well as snow ski and snowboard %u2013 and he was amazing at both, he was that guy that could just be good at any sport he tried. I had many crazy good times with him and could go on and on with stories, but two stick out. The time George Lindesmith invited us on a snow ski trip to Grand Targhee, Idaho, with his family and friends, which George still might be regretting to this day, and the Elko NALS conference where Rusty, CdeBaca, Mike Hagen, Floyd Wilson and I introduced Dave Mollenbergs Trimble reps to the Picon, they hated us for years after that night and avoided us at all costs as it went down in history as one of the best conferences ever! I am going to miss him making me laugh at his jokes and his love of life.