A few days ago I had the sad task of telling my brother, currently living on the other side of the world, that our Uncle, my mother's brother had passed away. I knew he'd be sad. Thirty-six hours passed and I received a beautiful email, telling me stories of their exploits together when he was just a boy, stories that I hadn't heard before. The tendency was for my brother to spend time with his Uncle whilst I spent time with my mother's sister and mother. I hadn't thought about this much until now, but that's the way it happened. I'm currently seeing if I can read his message at the Service because it tells the beautiful story of a deeply caring and fun loving man and the impact he had on his young nephew.
As fate would have it my brother was able to see the very good, fantastical and even magical aspect of his Uncle, whilst a few of his many children only saw the bad and stayed away from him in the last years of his life. I didn't see him often myself but my mother remained a wonderful Sister until his dying moments and I often tagged along with her for a visit or he tagged along with my mother for a visit when she came to see me. He was a good man, his heart was in the right place and there's no doubt that he was a natural oral storyteller. His son is a very famous playwright. We all have, on my mother's side, what my father referred to as "the gift of the gab" in some measure or another.
There is so much I could say at this time but blog posts are meant to be pithy, aren't they, so let me get to the point. After death, there's nothing but a void. There are no last chances, no more opportunities to make the peace, to say what you should have said years before, to be kind, to care, to say goodbye. We are here and then we are gone.Take your opportunities whilst you have them and use them well.
I am very pleased to say that my Uncle's youngest daughter has been very kind in the past year or so and she held an 85th birthday party for him and many of his children and siblings came to that; not all. There were a few notable absences, but this is life. We make our decisions and we must live with them.
He wasn't a particularly notable person - a businessman, a father and a husband who always did his best - but he made the most of every situation, thought the best of everyone and stayed positive in spite of enormous setbacks and difficulties. My uncle once sent some stories of his younger days to his son, the famous one. He returned them, explaining as tactfully as he could I am sure, that they weren't stories but reminiscences. Of course, there is nothing to stop a good story teller like him making use of those memories and turning them into stories. Now that he has passed over, I have my fingers crossed that this is exactly what will happen to them.
As fate would have it my brother was able to see the very good, fantastical and even magical aspect of his Uncle, whilst a few of his many children only saw the bad and stayed away from him in the last years of his life. I didn't see him often myself but my mother remained a wonderful Sister until his dying moments and I often tagged along with her for a visit or he tagged along with my mother for a visit when she came to see me. He was a good man, his heart was in the right place and there's no doubt that he was a natural oral storyteller. His son is a very famous playwright. We all have, on my mother's side, what my father referred to as "the gift of the gab" in some measure or another.
There is so much I could say at this time but blog posts are meant to be pithy, aren't they, so let me get to the point. After death, there's nothing but a void. There are no last chances, no more opportunities to make the peace, to say what you should have said years before, to be kind, to care, to say goodbye. We are here and then we are gone.Take your opportunities whilst you have them and use them well.
I am very pleased to say that my Uncle's youngest daughter has been very kind in the past year or so and she held an 85th birthday party for him and many of his children and siblings came to that; not all. There were a few notable absences, but this is life. We make our decisions and we must live with them.
He wasn't a particularly notable person - a businessman, a father and a husband who always did his best - but he made the most of every situation, thought the best of everyone and stayed positive in spite of enormous setbacks and difficulties. My uncle once sent some stories of his younger days to his son, the famous one. He returned them, explaining as tactfully as he could I am sure, that they weren't stories but reminiscences. Of course, there is nothing to stop a good story teller like him making use of those memories and turning them into stories. Now that he has passed over, I have my fingers crossed that this is exactly what will happen to them.
I am sorry for your loss. He sounds like a fine man, who, while not famous, touched this world in a very positive way. As I get older, I value the musings of family members much more; who they were and how they saw the world.
ReplyDeleteSusan
Susan: It's interesting that as we grow older we begin to value different things. I think it's the sense of being able to imagine walking in someone else's shoes. I can see him at his old typewriter writing his memories down and they had value. It's an era that won't come again and he did a kind of work that is a whole other world. My father probably wasn't able to get into my brother's inner youthful world so this Uncle filled that gap beautifully. What mattered to my brother as a child is coming out just in the past few years and I'm intrigued at what he remembers and what mattered to him. It's helped me to remember things and to understand him better. I think as we grow older we take less for granted and hopefully we are more respectful of what matters to others.
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