We celebrate Mother’s Day and Father’s Day and we do so with good reason. But there is no Uncle’s Day…no day to honor or recognize the gifts that those dear to us — some of them related to us, some of them not — who have touched us and shaped the way that we view the world.
My Uncle Jake (Jacob J. Schmidt III) is one of those people. I say “is,” though he died a few weeks ago, because like others who touch and shape us, his life has made an impact upon me that lives on. I also use the present tense because I take seriously the conviction that he is alive.
One of the many gifts that my Uncle gave me and one which I don’t think that we talk about often enough was his singular, unshakeable resolve to do the right thing.
He fought in North Africa in the Army Air Corps and returned home to build and raise a family. He worked steadily, responsibly and honorably in a series of automobile dealerships as a mechanic and service manager. Out of concern for his community, he helped found and then provided leadership for the creation of a volunteer fire department; and he contributed regularly in many other ways to the neighborhood in which he lived.
But perhaps the most striking feature of that singular resolve was the care that he gave his wife, my aunt, over the last decade. Struggling with the vagaries of Alzheimers, my Aunt Mil slowly lost her ability to connect with the world around her. On one occasion, she even slapped my Uncle for being fresh when he tried to give her a gentle kiss on the cheek. (I joked with him that I was fairly sure it had been a long time since she had done that to him.)
In spite of the demands of caring for her, however, my Uncle kept his wife at home. Now the fact that he did and others do not is not my point here. There are endless variables involved in making decisions of this kind and no one can sit in judgment on the decisions others make in response to the demands of the illness my aunt suffered. But what did strike me was the resolve that marked his care for her. In one conversation some months ago, in a matter of fact way, he observed, “I said I would take care of her when I married her and that’s what I am going to do.”
Now my cousins will tell you that there was no little amount of “Dutch” in that declaration — which is the way my family has always labeled German intractability and they are right — it is shot straight through the family. But I know enough about my Uncle to know something else and so do they: My Uncle was a man of faith and his faith taught him that beyond the trials and injustices in this world there is a reckoning with what is and should be — call it the will of God, call it the right thing — he believed that the choices we make in this life are shaped by considerations beyond it.
It was that resolve that carried him through the years and sustained him in the final days of his life, during which his primary concern was to return home to care for his wife. He did for little more than a day and then died.
My aunt had a stroke this last week and she is fading fast. It may be that even Alzheimers cannot so completely destroy our powers of perception that she is unaware that the strong arms and firm resolve that was life of her life is gone.
Such is the gift — and the example — in what seems simple and strong.
Prayers for your aunt and all who care for her, and for you and all who have lost a remarkable relative, your uncle. I agree with Tom Brokaw that his was “the finest generation.”
A long married couple in our parish died within months of each other a few years ago. As much as we missed them, we gave thanks that they were together again, with God and without illness or infirmity.
Dear Fred,
May you feel the prayers from many for comfort over the passing of your Uncle. Thank you for sharing his life with us. It is easy to understand the impact he had upon you. Would that all men had such an uncle or even an earthly father. One thing for sure is that all of us can have a Heavenly Father.
Also, thank you for sharing about your Mother recently. In your openness you bless us so much. We not only get to know you better but your comments give wisdom which help us live our life in a more fully completed fashion.
God bless you, Fred.
Carol Lawson