Unc

My mom and her older sister always called him what their parents called him: Junior. Seeing as he was named after his father, that made sense. My friends would inevitably chuckle the first time they heard me speak of my "Uncle Junior." And mom laughed about the way her "baby brother" now dwarfed her.

A lifelong bachelor, as far as I know he always lived with his parents. They were somewhat older when they'd started having children, and since he was the youngest of their three, my memories are of a devoted son taking care of elderly parents who had quite a few health issues, between Grandmom's weight and diabetes, and Granddad's hearing loss (related to WWI naval service) and frequent "spells." He'd usually drive them to our frequent family get-togethers. Thanksgiving was always at my aunt's family's big house, since it was easier for everyone to go there than for them to pack up my eight cousins and have the ten of us kids falling all over each other elsewhere. The Christmas routine was always the same: Grandmom, Granddad, and Unc (though we didn't really abbreviate his title until we were grown) always went to my aunt's house on Christmas Eve, came to ours on Christmas Day. A few days later the whole crew would be together for my sister's birthday, just as we'd been at a cousin's birthday a couple weeks before. With ten of us nephews and nieces, birthday parties were frequent.

Unc was my Confirmation sponsor. I never met my godparents, and I had so much respect for him that I didn't really consider having anyone else sponsor me. He was disappointed that the bishop didn't symbolically slap us on the cheek anymore by then, as had formerly been part of the ceremony. (It seems we've lost the idea of purposeful self-sacrifice and hardship, seeing the latter as something to be avoided in all contexts.)

I lost touch with them all for a while after getting married (a small ceremony, somehow without room for my cousins; how could I have let that happen?) and joining the service. Grandmom had died before I enlisted, and Granddad a few years after. While I was home for the funeral, Mom told me she and my stepfather were moving to Georgia, and subsequent visits to Maryland became centered on my wife's family. How easily I lost sight of the relationships that were so important to me growing up. I eventually realized my folly. Having finally dealt with some things I needed to from my childhood, I strove to recover the relationships I'd thrown out with the bath water. With Aunt Helen divorced (why did both sisters marry alcoholics?), she and Unc were by then sharing the same house at which we'd visited their parents on Sundays growing up for as far back as I can remember. On every trip home we began to make it a point to go by there for a while. It never really seemed like a long enough visit when the girls or the mrs. - or later, the grandkids - would start feeling restless already, and it would be time to leave behind again the sofa on which I'd slept over (eventually a new sofa in the same place), the lawn I'd mowed, the garden I'd weeded, the aunt and uncle I loved.

When my mom passed away, shortly after 9/11, her brother and sister took a train to GA for the funeral; there was just no way Helen was getting on a plane that soon after. You could amass a fortune betting on Amtrak to be late; I went to pick them up at the train station, anxiously waited for them to arrive, and drove them to the funeral home knowing that everyone was waiting for us so they could start the service. Afterward we had a nice lunch together at Mom's favorite joint, an Irish pub on the grounds of a winery a few miles from the house. My aunt helped us go through Mom's clothes so my stepfather wouldn't have to deal with that, and we headed for our respective homes in the next day or two. My aunt says that it was on the train back home that Unc first noticed blood in his stool.

I wonder if things might've been different for him if he'd been able to have the cancer surgery right away rather than urgently needing a multiple bypass first to survive it, or if he hadn't been the first family member to develop colorectal cancer, or if he'd started getting colonoscopies a few years before, as we now know we should. But his battle was valiant and he remained dignified and fun-loving throughout, getting to Atlantic City one last time this past summer, a couple years after one of his best gambling buddies had died. Unc had hated not being there for his funeral; John had died unexpectedly during one of Unc's worst hospitalizations.

I can't help but think I may have shirked my responsibility to him by not sharing the Lord's love more openly. St. Francis said, "Share the Gospel; when necessary, use words," and with some folks the words really are necessary. Yeah, I may have made a special trip or two home specifically to visit with him. In the hospital, we'd agreed that he'd tell me when he was ready for me to leave - which he expected to be after fifteen or twenty minutes - or I'd let him know when I was ready to go; somehow a couple hours flew by before either of us realized it. Or last November, for one last Thanksgiving; Unc may not have been cooking from scratch anymore, but having so many of us celebrating this holiday with him again was still a real treasure for all of us. At the party this summer, we knew we were probably together with him for the last time. As I tried to tell him how closely I was holding him in prayer, he never quite seemed to connect with just what I was trying to convey: how much the Lord loves him, how He longs be our strength and comfort in such challenging times.

Still, I hope Unc saw beyond my presence to the One who was leading me, each time, to be there. I hope he, too, felt the embrace of the One whose perfect Peace, beyond understanding, guards my heart and mind especially at such times as these, saying goodbye to one of the few really respectable men in this broken boy's life.

I pray the angels have escorted him home to a joyful reunion with his parents, sister, brothers-in-law, cousins, and dear friends who have preceded him, in jubilant rejoicing before the throne of glory of our loving God.

A favorite parable

I haven't done one of these posts in a while, but I've always loved the Gospel reading for this coming Sunday.

When Jesus says, "The kingdom of heaven is like . . . ," we know we'll learn a lot by paying attention to how the kingdom is similar to the parable. In this case, while the master (Lord) calls all the laborers, those who labor all day (their whole lives) receive no greater reward than those who enter the vineyard at the very end. Those exhausted laborers are clearly put out by their perceived unjust treatment at the hands of the landowner, and we might agree: something just doesn't seem right.

Some context: I'm no Scripture scholar, but I'd bet that around the time St. Matthew set down his Gospel, the idea of Jesus' imminent return was still pretty common. There were probably many Christians who'd followed the Way for decades - even their whole lives - while others were just entering the community. Perhaps there was quite a bit of jealously among some of the oldsters that these Johnnies-come-lately would receive the same reward. If so, this teaching of Jesus would have been particularly timely for the Church of that day.

Here's what now strikes me reading this parable: when Jesus says, "The kingdom of heaven is like . . . ," we can also find great insight by focusing on how the kingdom isn't like to the parable. In this case, the dissimilarities are huge.

Consider the wage. In the parable, each laborer receives a denarius, which was a day's wage for a laborer. It certainly wasn't much money, though considered fair, and perhaps easily taken for granted. By contrast, the reward which Christ has purchased for us is to exchange the death we deserve for eternal, abundant life. God gives us His very, infinite Self. What laborer could rightly claim to deserve this, let alone expect more?

It's as if the Lord is saying, "Even if all we were talking about were a pittance, you'd have no room for complaining that I'm generous to others. In truth, my generosity to you is already infinite, and no amount of my sharing it with others could ever diminish it! Your labor ought not be an attempt to earn what is fair, because no amount of toil could wipe away your sin, let alone earn what I give you! Rather, let your works be your loving response to the priceless gift of my love. Instead of being jealous, rejoice that others receive my grace as well!"

Could it be that we, today, often take the Lord's generosity to us for granted, too? I know I'm sometimes tempted to. But I'm also painfully aware of how great my sinfulness has been, and that no amount of my labor could ever wipe it clean.

Thank you, Lord, for your great mercy. May your mercy abound in the lives of others, and may I never grumble against you.

Looking beyond the frustration

Okay, with a challenging century planned on Saturday, weather permitting, followed by a 55-mile return trip on Sunday, I thought I should get in a fairly casual 20-some miler today. My group was riding at 5:30, and I figured I'd go out with them, and head back on my own from our regular first stop.

I could see that plan start to fall apart when oldest called me shortly before lunch, asking where her mom was. She was having a lot of pain from her chronic illness, needed to go to the ER, and wanted to ask her mom to pick up the kids. I knew mom was going to be incommunicado until lunch time, but would probably be available. I also knew that meant the possibility of 6 grandkids at the house after work instead of the usual two, and that might mean a rearrangement of my plans.

I wasn't prepared for the phone to ring again at 4:15. Mrs. tg had all six grandkids and one grown daughter with her, and a van with a dead battery. Ugh. So I go get her jump started and safely home, but it's clear I'm going to have to take the older grandkids home when mom's ready. There goes the group ride. By the time I get back to the house it's nearly sunset, but I still have to get a ride in today. Tomorrow evening is too close to Saturday.

So instead of the easy ride I had planned, I'm now pushing for all I'm worth trying to get just a dozen miles in before it gets completely dark. And as I'm riding out, I'm growing more and more frustrated over how I'm pushing much harder than I wanted to, and resenting how things have worked out.

Then I started to realize how lucky I really am. I had a perfectly functional second vehicle to go help out my wife with. I'm healthy, not having to deal with all the issues my daughter has to face all the time, and able to ride so vigorously in response to my frustration. I was able to spend unexpected time with my grandkids. It remains to be seen whether my planned ride this weekend, about which I'm pretty excited, will come to fruition. In short, I really needed to shift my focus such that I wasn't so consumed by the fact that my plans were short-circuited and remember how many blessings I have.

I'm amazed at how a good workout can help redirect my energy so that I can see things more clearly.

Grandkids are great!

Another fabulous weekend. Capped off with an impromptu cookout tonight with our oldest and her 4. What a fine time. A short while later, our youngest called. Her 3-year-old daughter excitedly told us that she "caught two fishies. One little one, and one big one!" Saturday evening she was showing us how she casts. Too cute!

Another fine ride this weekend, too. Nothing formal, but a metric century (a little over; a metric is 100km, or 62 miles, versus a century of 100 miles) on Sunday that was more challenging than the century the previous week. I was riding with the racers on Sunday, and while I may have been behind them in spots, I mostly hung pretty well. I did tail off toward the end, mostly due to not eating enough, I think. Now, if the weather isn't too hateful next weekend, I may get in the OKHT yet . . .