In Loving Memory

Sunday night I received a call telling me that my Uncle Bro had passed away earlier that day. He was 90 and not in the best of health and he had a heart attack.

Although I hadn't communicated with him in several years, it tore my heart out to hear of his passing. I've always thought of him as the rock and back-bone of my family.

A good part of his life was dedicated to military service and as such, he was a strict disciplinarian but he didn't have a mean-spirited bone in his body. He was very loving and I never, for a moment, doubted his love for me. I never once doubted that he would be there for me if I needed him.

There are two memories I have of him that pretty much sum up the kind of man he was. The first was from when I was 12 or 13 years old. Me and my sisters were visiting my grandmother and Uncle Bro and Aunt Marion (his wife) came to visit. My grandmother lived on a 99 acre ranch and lived in a 2 bedroom house (with one bathroom) so when my aunt and uncle showed up, they got the guest bedroom and me and my sisters got to sleep on blankets in the living room. One morning my uncle came into the living room and barked at us to get up. I grumbled, "Five more minutes." and he left the room. Five minutes later he came back into the room said our five minutes was up and he jerked the blanket out from under us. Not only did that get us up, from then on, we got up the first time he told us to. :)

The other one was from 14 or 15 years ago. He and my aunt were renewing their vows for their 50th wedding anniversary (if I remember correctly, they actually did it closer to their 51st wedding anniversary). I flew up to be there (there being West Virginia) for the event and when they were exchanging their vows, my uncle got choked up and right before he "kissed his bride" he told my aunt how much he loved her, and then everyone else got choked up. It was very emotional and I was so glad I was able to make it.

His funeral is tomorrow in a town outside of Dallas and because of the ridiculous-extremely-out-of-the-ordinary cold weather we're having (accompanied by rain and icy roads), I won't be able to make it and it makes me sick.

To Uncle Bro - you will be missed.

8/26/20 - 2/6/11