My uncle

My rants on America the beautiful, hidden sources of wheat (corn muffins and tomato soup!!), and television will have to wait while I post another maudlin article on my uncle.

First, by the numbers. My uncle was born in 1927, and he will be 86 in June. When he was 13, he watched his best friend get run over by a car; at 14 his mother died; at 17 he dropped out of high school and joined the navy. It was 1944 and he spent a year escorting convoys across the Atlantic; when the European theatre ended, he was posted to the Pacific where they were having trouble convincing the Japanese on remote islands that the emperor had surrendered. He came back to his home state
of Connecticut, got a job in an insurance company, and married a woman 6 years his senior. He was a natural born salesman, with an easy disposition and a penchant for alcohol, and he soon made his way into the hot new sector of office calculators.

His company moved him to Florida just as the Kennedy space center moved to Houston; they then moved him to Silicon Valley while it was still a sleepy little suburb, and finally they moved him to Atlanta. His wife didn't enjoy the south and quietly moved back to Connecticut, then proceeded to divorce him. In Atlanta he met, and married, a true southern belle, and they've been married 44 years now.

Sadly, the past few years my uncle has been sliding downhill. 18 months ago, when I visited, I was sure it would be the last time I saw him. Remarkably, he pulled through, and last July he was doing quite well. This trip I thought he was doing okay, except this morning he was still asleep at 10am. I went in to wake him, and when he opened his eyes and saw me, he was absolutely terrified. He recovered quickly, but I knew something wasn't right -- for years the man always woke up and said the exact same thing: "I'll get a job in the morning, ma." It was one of those jokes that had passed from being annoying to hilarious, and I'd give anything to hear it again. Seeing the fear in his eyes was heartbreaking.

He got up and had a cup of coffee, but when he went in the kitchen to put the cup in the sink, we heard the thump. No yell, just a thump. I was the first in there, and he was sprawled on the floor with his head still propped up by the oven. His elbow had a small cut and his head was a bit braised, but no other obvious injuries, but all he wanted to do was lie down. Obviously, I couldn't let him nap on the kitchen floor, but I also discovered I couldn't lift 150 pounds of dead weight. I guess I'd never tried to pick someone up before; I was actually surprised at how ineffectual I was, and it certainly made me appreciate my 93-pound aunt, who has had to deal with this several times before.

I eventually got him into a chair and he eventually recovered, although he was incoherent for a while. He later went to bed, and I ran some errands. After I came home, and with everyone else asleep, I saw him come out of the bedroom, go in the kitchen, open the box of tea bags I'd brought (yes, I brought my own tea!) and tear one open. At that point I intervened, taking away the teabag and asking what he was doing, and he was completely incoherent, and inconsolable, worried about something he needed me to ship to his mother-in-law. I got him to sit down again and after a while he was back.

Around 5pm he went back to bed and I followed him in, and he wanted to talk so I sat beside him. He said some profound things, he said some nonsensical things, he reminisced about his first dog, Buddy (although he couldn't remember his favorite dog, Clancy), we talked about getting old, about what's important, about who we were. (The parallels to his life are remarkable: In his late 30s he'd been married for about 16 years, got divorced, moved to a new area, got remarried, and started his life over.) But mostly we just gushed over how much we mean to each other, in some tear-stained moviehouse version. Of course, it might have helped if he could hear a word I said, but he is completely deaf.

But it really got me to thinking how people connect. We are, to use an English expression, "chalk and cheese" -- he is witty where I am thoughtful; he savours the past while I am planning the future; he is social and likes crime novels and crossword puzzles, whereas I can't stand any of that. He's hopeless with money, can't cook an egg, has never done his own laundry, and likes to get big dogs and let them go feral. He thinks all of his friends look like actors, such that you can hardly watch a show without him saying, "Doesn't that look like so-and-so?" (The answer, invariably, is "no.")

But the trait that he has that I don't, the one thing I envy him for, and the reason I'm so grateful to be part of his life, is that he really cares about people. Not superficially, not casually, not condescendingly, but from the core of his being, he genuinely cares, and people respond to that no matter their age, background, or circumstances.

Sure, some people have taken advantage of him (his step-daughter and grandson, to name two), and he's lost touch with most of his friends over the years (mostly because his hearing keeps him from using the phone and his eyesight keeps him from driving), but I know from talking to his friends over the years, that they all kept George in a special place in their heart.

Tomorrow will be my last day here; I probably won't get back for another 8 months, maybe longer. I will leave my aunt and her mother to watch over George, although neither of them are in better physical condition. The neighbor who kept an eye on him has moved away, and the people who take him to church (usually against his wishes) only see him on Sunday. His doctor has George on a dozen pills, some of which I wish he would stop taking -- I don't know how much longer George has, but at this stage I'd prefer he had a clear mind than lower cholesterol -- but otherwise can't do anything to make George healthier or more comfortable.

Part of me would like to put George in a home, where I know he'd be safe and looked after, but I know the only things that are important to him are his wife, his dog, and his bed -- taking all three away would be worse than death. I don't know what happens next -- Lord knows I wish I had the answers -- other than I go back to England, not because I have family there, or roots there, or anything there really, other than I like it there. And I leave my uncle, this man I profess to love, the closest thing I've had to a father for 15 years, to face his uncetain future...without me.