But this post is important to me. I'm so very sad that I must write it.
Several weeks ago, the world lost yet another great man. A strong man. A man who resonated peaceful, knowing strength to his very core.
My Uncle Mike passed away in mid-September following a long, unfair and I suspect painful struggle to remain in this world day after day, to hold his wife's hand for as long as he could, to sit and enjoy his blueberry pie or a bowl of soup, and to read the daily paper.
Aunt Ruth and Uncle Mike
My Uncle Mike wasn't really my uncle at all. He was my grandmother's brother and my dad's uncle. But he's been a vital part of my life... he has always been there. At family events, when he'd call my brother and I to the side and quiety place a rolled up $5 dollar bill in our hands and say, in that beautiful, low baritone voice of his, "Put that in your pockets and don't tell your parents." At my grandmother's house, where he often visited for a meal or a talk. At graduation parties, on the phone, wherever we might need him or want to share with him, he'd be there.
He was, I think, very, very close to my grandmother. I know that when my grandmother was taking care of their parents after they fell ill, he would come one night every weekend and take over the caretaker duties so my grandparents could have the evening together. After my grandmother passed away without warning several years ago, he held me in his great, bear-size embrace while I sobbed at her wake, and from that moment on he was there for my grandfather in every way he could possibly be. They shared weekly lunches with his wife, my Aunt Ruth, and they took good care of each other.
For my Uncle Mike, family was everything.
To me, Uncle Mike was always almost more than a man, somehow larger than life. He seemed, somehow, all knowing, and remarkably at peace with the world. Maybe this was the result of his years behind the wheel of Mac trucks. Maybe it was the influence of my wonderful Aunt Ruth (or sweet Aunt Betty, God bless her soul). Maybe it was the result of growing up in an Italian family in Chicago. Maybe it was caused by something about which I know nothing.
But that inner peace, that wonderful joy that he always expressed when he saw us, that happiness to just be alive...those are things that I shall always try to emulate.
He was a man I loved and respected, and the world is so much less in his absence.
Farewell, Uncle Mike. You are in our thoughts, in our hearts and in our prayers. Until we meet again...
