Homage to Uncle Bert

 

For those of you who have been reading these posts for all of these years, I appreciate that you put up with the random assortment of topics. They bounce between health related issues, responses to relevant headlines, and updates of old posts. Some are more personal musings. This is one of those. An Homage to our Uncle Bert Uncle Bert was born in NY in 1929. He was an optometrist. I remember going to his office under the shadow of the old World Trade Center. He moved to Florida in the 80s. He was fiercely independent, never married, but ended up being the ultimate caregiver to many of his family members. He lived alone until he was 90, but moved into a wonderful assisted living facility right before Covid changed the world as we knew it. Our Uncle Bert had the travel bug. Not only did he go all over the world, but he had the lofty goal of visiting all 50 states in the US. He had made it to every state except North Dakota. Several years ago, I got a good laugh when he told me that he had used some frequent flyer miles to book a flight to Fargo. He left the airport, rented a car, drove around a little bit, returned to the airport and then got back on a plane and went home. Mission accomplished. When he traveled he would take hundreds of photos. This was before the age of digital cameras. He would develop them as slides, pick a handful of the best shots and simply discard the rest. I don’t think any of his North Dakota photos made the cut. There is a good lesson there. He didn’t weigh himself down with things that weren’t worthy or important. His favorites were some candid shots of kids and animals that were absolutely magical. To this day, if I catch sight of an endearing moment, I think “that would be an Uncle Bert shot!” Uncle Bert didn’t sweat the small stuff. This became apparent in one of my very first interactions with him.  He generously allowed 19 year old Sandy to borrow his old stick shift Toyota. We hadn’t driven very far when we realized that if there were any brakes left, they weren’t working very well. That was one scary ride. When we returned the car with a, “Hey Uncle Bert, thank you so much for lending us the car, BUT, uh….you need new brakes!” The response was, “yeah, probably true. I just down shift and go slow” He may have gone slowly in his car, but until his last year or so, I could barely keep up with him on foot. I remember waiting for him to exit security at the airport on his last visit to San Francisco. I waited and waited, I got a call from baggage claim where Sandy had gathered both Uncle Bert and his small suitcase. He had zoomed by so fast that I missed him. I guess I had been waiting for an ambling elderly fellow.  During that same visit, we surprised him with front row seats to a Giants game. It turns out that he had bought some bleacher tickets in advance. This almost 90 year old had a grand time scalping his ticket outside the stadium before joining us inside the park. Sadly, Uncle Bert died last week. He was the last relative of Sandy's from that generation. Due to the pandemic, we hadn’t been able to see him in person. We were all set for a visit this spring. Sigh, I am so sad that we didn’t make it in time. Here is something my sister-in-law (Sandy's sister) wrote about him: Bert was our mother's oldest brother and the last of the four siblings to survive. He was a few weeks short of 94, and we can truly say that he lived until he died. He walked on a treadmill daily; did the New York Times crossword puzzle daily - in ink; listened to Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, Dinah Washington, and his favorite, the Mills Brothers, on the computer; watched every sport on tv and could tell you who the superstars were. He loved playing tennis in his younger days and was looking forward to this week's Australian Open, when due to the time difference, he would get up in the middle of the night to watch it live. He also watched every episode of Big Bang Theory over and over again because, as he put it, "I never remembered what happened so each time was like it was the first time." He was unique. We loved him and will miss him. I am grateful I was part of his life for 45 year! We spoke on the phone regularly. His refrigerator was covered with photos of his great-great-nephew Elliot. Especially the ones where we captured an “Uncle Bert” moment. I am grateful that he lived well and passed relatively easily. Because it is in my nature for most of these posts to have a ‘takeaway’, here it is. If you are still fortunate enough to have older relatives, try to make it a habit to call them on a regular basis. A week passes, a month passes before you realize it has been a long gap in between your calls. Something as simple as a calendar reminder can help you make then happen on a more regular cadence. Enjoy your loved ones while you have them. If you have the opportunity, look at their photos and have them help you identify the people in them and tell you their stories. Once the final generation is gone, so many stories and family information is gone with them.