Ruth left me a message last night that Uncle Jim passed away Sunday around noon.
Uncle Jim was Aunt Lois' husband.
So guess who is doing the officiatin'? There was a rumor going around that Olivet Christian Church in Center wasn't going to let any guest officiants after that mess that was the message at my aunt's service. Apparently this rumor is not-so-reality-based.
The service is Saturday, and like previous funerals involving husbands (or former husbands) of my aunts, I don't think I'll make it.
(At least I don't think I made it to Deana Mae's husband's funeral. I was pretty young at the time, but maybe I was there... one of my earliest memories was of seeing him still alive, though.)
Rachel's former husband Bill passed away back in 1999, I think... I know the service was on the day Ruth and I had to move out of that duplex in Overland Park, anyway. So I didn't make that one.
This time around, since I'm afraid I could go to prison for aiding my Aunt Rachel in killing "that S.O.B." that spoke so... well, "insultingly" doesn't really cut it, does it?
Anyway, I'm afraid I'd be all-too-cooperative in any plan she had to harm "that S.O.B.", so I think I'll stay away. I'm not sure if Dane is going. I need to see if we'd all like to contribute to some sort of flower arrangement or something.
There was this time when I was very young--say, mid-elementary age or so--and I realized my dad was so much older than everyone else's dad. Shawn Couch's dad coached us in little league, and did stuff with us. My dad was mostly... well, old and in the very early stages of the emphysema that finally took his life in the mid-80s. I remember thinking something along the lines of, "So, who do I have in the family who is like a younger dad?"
Uncle Jim came the closest. Uncle Bill (Rachel's husband) was way off in Omaha. I remember thinking it should be my mission in life to hang out with Uncle Jim, but on my next visit out to their place, I realized he was way too busy to hang out with me--and plus, most of the stuff they did on the farm was so foreign to me, I'd be of no use around the place.
I hadn't thought much about that until just now. Odd stuff, eh?
Anyway, I basically accepted that I didn't really have a "younger dad" figure like most of the kids I knew did, and I moved on with my life. Until now, when I've suddenly decided to dwell on it.
Okay, back to the discussion about urine samples in trucks.
1 comment:
Well, it didn't help there was this odd sense of distance between Dad and... well, I won't speak for my siblings, so I guess I'll leave it a "me". I'd say it was my imagination, but the whole Year of the Soap Opera during my college days discredits the whole "my imagination" theory.
Also, Mom was like 12 years younger than Dad, so I don't know that I ever had that issue with her.
I KNEW there was more than just the whole small-town thing that made Ike and I somewhat of like minds back in the days of Jewell!
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