Uncle John

Growing up, I think all my dad's male family members (who were older than him) had been in the military at one time or another. My memory is somewhat sparse so it plays out probably more as a caricature of who they were than as they existed.

There was an Uncle Joe (my dad's uncle) who fought in the Korean War. He rolled his own cigarettes. I vaguely remembering him saying that there were so many Chinese that they fought against in that war that bodies would pile up to the point that they would actually have to readjust their machine guns to shoot over the bodies that were there. He also said something along the lines that the North Koreans and Chinese would actually send people into battle without weapons and that when the people who did have weapons would fall in battle, those without would just pick up where they dropped off (meaning that there were some Chinese and N Koreans with weapons). Uncle Joe is dead - I remember how angry my dad was in how they buried him (his words - in a small pine box).

Uncle Bobby was older (my dad's brother-in-law) but I'm not sure that he actually served. I'm not sure that he didn't either. He still lives in Atlanta and I should probably call him about this. Uncle Bobby doesn't smoke.

There was an uncle Johnny - uncle Johnny only had one eye. As a small child (like under 5) he was very scary. There's not much I remember about him except that I think he rolled his own cigarettes too. He was also one of my dad's uncles. He was a Shannon (my granny's maiden name), as was uncle Joe.

This post, however, is not really about any of them. This is about John Wayne. I used to think that John Wayne was a distant relative of

ours, or a really good friend of my dad's. Part of this might be due to the fact that if the television was on (especially during the weekend and even more so after we got basic cable) we were watching a western.

My daddy's favorite westerns seemed to star John Wayne.

To me, he kind of resembled my dad (which might be another reason for the association). To some degree, I believed that all men knew how to handle a gun, had a southern / western accent, used brill cream and served in the military or was a cowboy (or both). The distance between then and now is great. I know how to handle a gun, but that's where the similarities end. Most people tell me that I don't really have an accent (being their words and not mine, I wonder if most of them think that my accent is in fact nondescript or if there is a geography that it might belong to). I don't use brill cream, but I do sometimes use pomade, wax or gel. I was never in the military. I own a cowboy hat and I've worked in a couple of fields but I've never roped a calf (though... I've known a people who have worked some rodeos).

The distance doesn't end there though. There's the realization that maybe manhood wasn't about that - but that whatever it is, I still don't measure up (and don't know a lot of people who might). There's the reality that all my dad's uncles, my dad... and John Wayne... are all dead. There's the reality that everything uncle John (Wayne) did was an act.

He did it to make money.

He did it to make movies.

He did it to make believe.

Strange that even when looking at an image of a somewhat type-cast multi-personalitied western idol... I still think of lazy summer afternoons in Alabama. I think of sweet tea in mason jars that would sweat just as much as we did, but taste and feel like a little bit of heaven on earth. I think of falling asleep in a t-shirt and a my tighty whiteys while my back was against my daddy's (he would normally wear the same thing). I remember afternoons that never seemed to end as they were inundated with black and white pixels intermixed with commercials for local tire stores and national brands. I remember humidity so thick that it was hard to breath and afternoons that were so hot that we all thought we would combust. I think of my dads menthol flavored Benson & Hedges and how their smoke would waft around the room - how it went in through his mouth, found its way through his lungs and then back out from where it came.

Honestly... this makes me want to rent a few westerns to fall asleep to.

Thoughtless...

Tonight is one of those rarities where I just can't sleep.

We had dinner with a great many new friends in our new city from the church we've been a part of since we've been here [today = 5 months...I think]. In part, this was a celebration of the fruitfulness of a couple, and the fruitfulness of God's people. This couple had basically invited everyone who had brought them dinner after their giving birth of a new son. Needless to say, there were quite a few people there [hospitality is not patently Southern].

Fruitfulness is a wonderful thing. It is also a wonderfully scary thing. I imagine, however, when our first child comes along there will be a mix of emotion much to what I'm feeling tonight. I imagine that our child [our = me and La] will be a lot like I am; that literally scares me on more levels than you know [and I am not "just saying" this...] Part of what scares me is remembering how I reacted when taken to a grave site growing up.

That is, with indifference.

It was not with a flagrant disregard or in abject disrespect - it's just that I didn't know the person in the grave. I couldn't relate to who they were. I didn't have late night conversations with them, I never sat back and drank sweet tea on a hot Southern summer's afternoon with them, I never shot pool with them, nor did I play Scrabble on the living room floor with them.

But I did with my dad.

And so I think about taking my children to his grave in Huntsville, AL and how they'll react. What will they be thinking? I doubt that they'll have much of a thought of what life would have been with him - I never did [in regard to visiting the graves of people I never knew]. I don't ever think of life with my mom's parents, right [I had never met either of them before they passed]? Thinking about it the other way around - he'll never get to hold them in his lap and tell them about how goofy I was when I was their age. He'll never get cherish them, to see them grow, to see them change, or to be loved by them.

A lot of what I hoped for when he was still alive was that when I had a family, that he would get to see a different kind of faith being lived out than what he was accustomed to [being generally skeptical of "Chrsitians" altogether]. I literally used to dream about what it would be like to pray with my children in his house - how something like that might grip his heart [as none of our conversations re: Christ ever seemed to].

And now, all of that is...impossible.
And now, I rarely even pray with my own wife except for meals.

That aside, when I am in Huntsville, I rarely visit his grave. Being at his grave once was enough. His bones are there, his casket, a concrete vault, a suit [he only wore it twice in public that I know of - my wedding and his own funeral - he said it was what he'd be buried in], and a headstone paid in part by the US Government [your tax dollars at work in memory of a Vietnam Vet] are all there.

There are no memories there.

It is an unfamiliar place...a literally lifeless place. It was a place that he'd only been to once and was never able to leave. It was the last place I saw his body, but not the last place that I saw him. And if I were to ever take my children there, they might remark about the trees, the landscaped lawns, the pond down the hill, but not about how life was with him; they'll never know that life or his.

Tonight is one of those rarities where I can't sleep - even after being surrounded by new friends, after enjoying good food and drink... even in bed with my own wife... as the loneliness of death is weighing upon my own heart.