Archive for May, 2009
Remembering Uncle Bill
Uncle Bill was my favorite uncle. Not that the rest were slackers but Uncle Bill was special.
I spent more time with Uncle Bill than any of the other members of my mother’s family. Bill made time to be involved with us because we were family. Like the time he allowed me to bring my neighborhood friends to climb over his helicopter at Fort Belvoir. Or the two summers my brother and I spent at his house because of family issues.
There was a quality about Uncle Bill that demanded my attention. I was too young to analyze what it was about him; perhaps it was the way he talked or what he talked about. I suspect it was his playful zest for life. Like the time that he was eating hot peppers like candy and when I asked him what they were, he told me that they were good and I should try one (I tried one, in spite of the advice of everyone else at the dinner table). Then there was the time when he jumped out of the car to chase down the not so small alligator scurrying across the tank trail at Fort Stewart.
On Memorial weekend, I found a brochure I had been saving on the virtual wall and deicide to go out again and look again at my Uncle Bill’s page. Bill was killed a few days into his second tour in Vietnam. Along with some wonderful remembrances, there was a photo of Uncle Bill from 1966. I have only a few pictures of my Uncle Bill, but since most of them are from his early days they are hardly recognizable as the man I knew.
Seeing him again makes this Memorial Day special.