Uncle Bill

Bill was my uncle. And he was the uncle that lived the furthest away. For some reason he always had this mysteriousness about him. I was for some reason drawn to him. I didn’t realize what it was until today. You see for some reason I can remember almost every conversation that we had ever had. He would call up from Florida and I would be so excited to talk to him. We talked about music and he sent me Ted Nugent CD’s. We talked about cars and he always said he was going to send me a mustang but I knew that mustangs didn’t travel through the mail. We talked about motorcycles and I remember when I told him that I got my motorcycle license, he wanted to send me on of those too but all of his motorcycles were way to big for a beginner.

One summer, I was in Fort Lauderdale with some friends. Picture this. Beaches full of girls in bikinis and all I wanted to do was have lunch with my uncle. We finally met up on the last day I was in Florida. I ditched my friends for him.

Bill didn’t visit Connecticut that often but when he did it was always a special occasion to me. He came up to visit about two years ago when my grandmother was sick in the hospital. We went down to the hospital café to get some food; we sat there, ate, and talked just the two of us. For some reason I felt very close to my Uncle Bill. Today I realized that he truly, genuinely cared about not just me, but also my interests and what mattered to me. Of course I will miss him but I know exactly where he is right now. He is riding his motorcycle as fast as he wants to on a cloud high above. The wind feeds crisp clean air into his lungs. I’m sure he stopped just for a few minutes to look down on us here today with a smile that fills the sky.

Go ahead Bill, Go ahead and ride. It is what you went to heaven to do.