That night, my dear, kind uncle passed away suddenly. He had just turned 70, but you'd never have known it, based on his appearance and vitality. He seemed more like someone in his late fifties.
Some of my earliest memories in life involve him. He was pretty badass when I was little and seemed larger than life (perhaps in part because he was over six feet tall). He wore combat boots sometimes. He was a Vietnam vet. As we grew up, he took up car racing. He had an unreal knack for making good time on the trip from PA to MA or vice versa. He was a giver of sound, level-headed advice on many topics.
He was a gentle soul, but although I don't think I ever heard him raise his voice, we all just knew as kids that he was the one you didn't mess with. We weren't scared of him, really, we just knew that whatever we were trying to pull, we weren't going to put it over on him and it probably wasn't worth trying. But we knew without question that he loved us and was unfailingly focused on our well being.
As I got older, and became a truly stereotypical middle child, always feeling invisible and/or inadequate, my uncle was someone who had an uncanny and welcome ability to make me feel like I was very, very important, and that whatever answer I was giving to his questions of, "What's new, Linds?" were the only thing in the world he wanted to hear about right then.
When my husband joined our family, he was, of course, welcomed by my close-knit family as a whole, but even he picked up on how warm and genuine my uncle was. And my son, likewise, immediately adored my uncle and followed him around whenever he was near. At my brother's wedding last summer, although he'd only met my uncle a couple of times before, he ran to him, jumped into his arms, and proceeded to be generally enthralled the entire weekend.
It's hard to wrap my head around a world without this man in it. He wasn't someone I saw all that often, but he was a strong and constant presence nonetheless. I will miss him more than words can express. I wish my words could somehow ease the ache that my aunt and three cousins and their families are feeling, but I know that's an awfully tall order for mere words.
I hope my uncle is enjoying the peace wherever he is, perhaps chatting with my grandfather. I hope he knows how loved he was, and what an impact he had on all of us who knew and loved him. I hope he knows how much I'm going to miss being asked, "What's new, Linds?"
