My Uncle Died Yesterday

I got out of bed around 12:30, or so I thought.  When I looked at the clock on the landline phone, it actually was 2:30.  Reminds me the days when I was younger, and happier.  That I wasn't woken up before my body woke me up so far into the afternoon is pure bliss.

And I feel bad just typing this now because I am sad to report that my uncle died Thursday.  I was surfing the Internet when my sister called the landline, and then my brother texted me saying that he guessed that our uncle was dead.  I don't exactly know what he meant, but unless something happened after I visited him bedside Tuesday night, his condition didn't change.  (ETA on 4:30 p.m. on January 3, 2016 that I made an error on this; I am sure that the last time I visited my uncle when he was alive was actually Wednesday night, which would be January 2, 2013.)  So I got off the phone with my sister and texted him that thought.  To which a minute later he replied that, yes, he has died, Father told him that just now.

I text a lot, but it sucks.  It's less honorable than calling.  Texting is the preferred way to communicate nowadays because it indulges what we only perceive is our busy lives.  No, we like texting because we can glance at who it is and either answer enthusiastically about the latest gossip from high school or file the good wish note your grandmother just sent you until you're bored and have nothing else to do and you think this is the time to fulfill your obligations and reply with a text.  Before texting there was no way to set aside communication; when you're on the phone, you're committed, none of this, "I'll get to it when I want to" bullshit.  We don't talk anymore; we have conversations on DVR.

Sorry, sidetracked myself.  What I was getting to is that death is no time to be texting only, and I'm afraid that people are doing just that.  Shit, I should've been on the horn with my bro from the start.  But after texting that he was dead, I called him up: "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, Father just told me."

"I have to talk to him."

"Yeah, you do that."

My parents are doing this incredibly obnoxious thing where they switch their phones, so when I call Mother's phone I get Father, and vice versa.  I just assume that they're using each other's phones now.  My uncle was (shit, I can't believe I now have to refer to him in the past tense ... do I have to?  Or does that make me sound strange?) married to Father's sister, so I wanted to talk to him, and therefore I would have to call Mother's phone.  So naturally I get Mother.  I call for Father, and he promptly answers.

"Is uncle dead?"

"Yeah.  Uncle just told me."  (Father has three siblings, two brothers and a sister.  The fourth sibling lives in Philadelphia.)

So this means that my parents are coming home, I just don't know when.  And I don't know if they know that the visitation has been arranged for noon on Sunday, or that he will be cremated Monday at the same cemetery that his mom, my biological Grandmother, is buried in.

---

So you know what I did in reaction to the news that my uncle is gone?  I went out to the county records to look up the foreclosed property next door.  And then I ate at Hardee's.  And then I went home to try and take a nap.  And then I worked out.  And then I went to this pizza place at Uptown to see a waitress there that I know strips part-time.  And I had this all planned out at least since New Year's Day, the day I learned that my uncle didn't have long to live.

What are you supposed to do when you hear that a family member died?  A part of me feels like a stupid dick for going about my business like nothing happened.  But then what am I supposed to do, sit around at home and cry?  And then I feel guilty because I'm not crying.  I don't think I've ever cried when a family member has died.  Maybe it's because my parents beat the tears out of me whenever I cried over not getting what I want as a kid.  Or maybe I'm an asshole.

Another thing I went back-and-forth on: When do I reach out to those involved?  I think not calling my aunt or their kids (my cousins) tonight was the right thing to do.  I will try and see them at their place tomorrow, however.  Tonight I realized that I should at least talk to my uncle because Father said he is the point man for making the arrangements.  I wasn't going to call anybody tonight just because I thought that because I wasn't in the inner circle of immediate family (spouse and kids, possibly siblings) that I need to give them their space.  But I felt selfish if I didn't convey my concern somehow, and besides, maybe my uncle needed my help.  So I called him -- right before leaving the gym -- and he told me that he already made the plans for the visitation and the cremation.  Such an effort salved my conscience and fulfilled the proper level of caring in these circumstances that a civilized society demands.

---

He had a stroke three years ago and was bed-ridden ever since.  In fact, I don't think he left that health center/hospital once he was put into it.  To think that he was virtually imprisoned in that building, let alone his own paralyzed body ... this is why death is so ugly.

For that reason, maybe I should have seen this coming; he could have gone at any time.  But his death is still a shock to me.  I must confess: I hadn't thought a whole lot about him.  Maybe it's because he was in fucking St. Paul.  I still don't understand why and how my uncle couldn't get a place closer to where my aunt lived, and I still wonder if my aunt fought hard enough to bring him closer to her.  Maybe I used that as an excuse not to see him, but the family had to go out of our way to see him, and it was an inconvenience.

But maybe it also was because, even in his weakened state, he was hanging on.  He was deceptively healthy right through most of his old age.  I remember my uncle always being old, but somehow he was also always strong.  He would always help out with manly stuff around our house, stuff like going up on the roof to replace a shingle.  I remember him having a Cadillac, and taking me and my siblings to the mall close by.  And I will forever be indebted to him for switching out the old doorknob on my bedroom for one that locks.

He had the loudest sneeze in the world.  The first time I heard it my heart skipped a beat.  And without fail, he would sneeze three times in quick succession, so there would be this triple echo boom of sneezes that reverberated around the house.  Man, I still remember how that sounds.

And he had a bracelet saying that he was allergic to all antibiotics.  How in the hell can a man be allergic to all antibiotics?  Wouldn't he just die as a baby?  But really, seeing him do things around the house even though he didn't walk so much as shuffle his steps slowly across the floor made you think that not only was he going to be OK, but he was going to outlive all of us.  Of course, that couldn't happen.  And it didn't.

My uncle was a good man, and he lived a long life.

---

I just saw the last paragraph on my previous blog post: "I'll try and make it up to him by staying longer.  Hopefully I'll be able to see him, period, tomorrow."  And in that sense I let him down.