KINGSTON —Mike Bookey lived deliberately.

He was a sailor, a problem solver, a nationally recognized broadband futurists guru and a man who simply loved life. He didn’t wait for life to happen to him. Bookey, the Port of Kingston general manager since May 2007, died suddenly Sunday morning.

He lived with the same proactive determination as a salmon swimming thousands of miles to return home. And in the end he found his home in Kitsap, on a spit jutting out into the waters surrounding Driftwood Keys.

“Every storm would would try to push in his living room window and he just loved it. It was more akin to being in a sailboat than his house,” said Poulsbo City Councilman Ed Stern, a friend of Bookey. “God bless Mike Bookey. He was one of the originals.”

Bookey leaves an indelible void, both personally and professionally.

“I’d say the Port has really lost a very dynamic person and we’ve all lost a really close friend,” said Kingston Port Commissioner Pete DeBoer. “He just embraced the whole community. He loved to visit with the visitors. He always considered the guest dock a 56-room hotel that brought people here.”

Prior to coming to the port, Bookey lived a life of diversity. He moved to Kitsap from Issaquah.

Throughout his life he was passionate about University of Washington Huskies football and ran track for Washington in the late 1960s. His interest in broadband fiber optics and sailing rivaled his enthusiasm for Huskies sports.

An innovator in nationwide networks with the banking industry, he went on to own ViaLight and Digital Network Architects, both internationally known data systems consulting companies.

A published author, Bookey penned “America at the Internet Crossroads,” a well-received book that supplied a common sense approach to the importances of the Internet to economic and cultural development.

He operated Pachena Light Consulting, an online fiber optic information Web site developed in 2002 and named after one of Bookey’s and his wife Robin’s favorite sailing destinations: Pachena Light House on Vancouver Island.

However, it was in moving to Kitsap Bookey was able to delight in all of his loves while being semi-retired and skirting full retirement.

Stern recalled when the Bookeys first moved to the area Robin was catching an early morning ferry to Seattle for work, while Bookey stayed home to work on “America at the Internet Crossroads.”

“He needed to make a living,” Stern remembered. “It was tough for his wife to be going to work every day while he was pounding away on a book that hadn’t earned a dime. He felt guilty as hell.”

Bookey applied for the position at the port, and was hired.

Stern refers to this venture in employment as a testimony of Bookey’s ability to enjoy life in the present rather than putting off fun until he retired.

And the job at the port suited Bookey to a T, as it combined his every passion.

“He loved sailboating. He loved broadband. He got to stay in Kitsap and he got to kiss his wife goodbye every day,” Stern said.

Bookey’s relationship with the port was a symbiotic one.

During his nearly two-year stint, his accomplishments were many: He successfully secured a grant for the water transit system; he acted as a liaison between the federal government and the port; he lobbied for the port in Olympia; and was in the process of helping to remodel and expand the port and Mike Wallace Park.

“He was a problem solver,” Stern said. “He finished his life trying to solve the ferry problems. He died with his boots on, definitely. But one was already parked in Kingston.”

DeBoer will miss Bookey’s even-tempered and cordial attitude, his widespread expertise and his gift as an exceptional conversationalist.

DeBoer said the port’s attorney is taking care of the application process for hiring a new manager.

In the meantime, DeBoer will spend one or two days a week at the port office to make sure all the irons Bookey had in the fire keep burning.