David was born on December 24, 1966. His father was Alan T. Watts, and his mother was Carolyn Watts. David was an only child and grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, where he graduated from Calvert Hall High School.
After graduating from high school, David joined the United States Army and served from 1984 to 1987. David was stationed in Bamberg, Germany, before the fall of the Berlin Wall. He drove an M1A1 Abrams tank and received numerous commendations for his service.
Beginning in the early 1990s and continuing until his death, David was a respected IT professional, including as an instructor, programmer, and systems administrator.
David will be remembered for his wry sense of humor, stoicism, modesty, kindness, taciturnity, and introspectiveness.
David is survived by his cherished spouse and lifelong partner, Ernie Haffner, as well as their cats, Dena and Darin. David and Ernie met in 1988 and moved to Washington, D.C., in 2004. They exchanged rings on Ernie’s birthday in 1988, had a civil union in Vermont on September 23, 2000, and were married on June 1, 2010, less than three months after the District of Columbia legalized same-sex marriage.
