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Sunday, Apr. 20, 2003 / 1:33 p.m. ~My Uncle~ I scanned this photograph at work, a few years ago, and I didn't know how to use the scanner then, I still don't, and now I've converted it from a .bmp to a .jpg and it's losing in the translation, but here it is anyway:  Left to right we are: me, my mother, my sister, my mother's mother, my mother's brother, and my brother - seated is my mother's grandmother, my great grandmother. My mother looks pissed because she is looking at my father, the one taking the picture. I love the way my mother's hand reaches down to mine, and I smile, oblivious to the obvious tension between my parents, still married at that point. See my uncle's big smile? And the army crew cut? He was a military man, retired from the military, but he lived in Italy, was visiting us in our sleepy little hamlet of a suburb outside Chicago. This must have been 1965 or 1966, probably the latter, and I've seen this photo so many times I feel I can remember the moment, as it happened, I can remember my whole life as viewed through family photos in photo albums, loose, scattered, or organized and in multiples. My Uncle's granddaughter sent me email today, to let me know my Uncle is dying. Attached was a Word document, a little letter composed by him, written to me, and to friends whose names I'd never seen, telling us all about what's happened to him, how he turned 80 in January, how he lost his sanity in December, how he ended up in hospital, but he is better now, sane, though his prostate cancer has spread, metastasized. The granddaughter used the word 'terminal'. I felt so affected as I read it, excited to see his name in my email list, but then to read it was from her, not him, I knew it was bad, the words 'cancer' and 'terminal' jumped out at me. I began to cry, thinking, This is it, he is all I have left, and when he is gone, that's it. Maybe I'm out of touch with the whole 'loss' experience, maybe it's been too long since the last one went, maybe they all seemed to go so fast, my great grandmother, my sister, my mother, my grandmother, numerous dogs and cats along the way, all three of my cats, then the dissolution of my own relationships, everyone leaving, so much abandonment, and remaining strong all throughout, not allowing myself to feel anything at all because how can I? And what good would it do if I did feel? They go, people go, it's all you can count on, truly, in this life. We are here, inexplicably, then we are gone. Form attachments if you must, but everyone will go at some point. This is temporary, know that. But I can see him lying in his bed, with his catheter, yelling at his wife, his daughter, to remove it, saying he wants to go out shopping, he'll take his walker, he's in no pain, he wants to go outside. And I wonder if I could go there, could I hop a plane and fly to Italy, could I go see him, do I need to, would it be better, would it help anything at all? And yes, I want something, I want something from him, a little something he might leave to me, to show that he loved his sister's daughter, that he cared what happened to me, that he cares now, still, that I am alive and here, so far away. I am so glad to have answers, it's been too long I've been worried, since Christmas, but this is how I handle it, I keep it in a special place in the back of my mind, I compartmentalize because it's the only way to survive with strength. That's all going away now, my own history is rising to the surface and suddenly I see everyone who's ever been here, and I'm more aware than ever that they're all gone. I was tempted to forward the email to my brother, but then I realized he wouldn't care. It wouldn't matter to him the year he spent in Italy with my Uncle and his family, he has animosity now, it's all about him, and what attention wasn't paid, about the falling out, the anger, the mistrust, the disillusionment, the questions, when the 'tragedy' occurred, how his own mother disowned him, and how can he care about any of us after that? He probably thinks our Uncle is already dead, and no doubt doesn't care. I wrote back, of course, immediately, through tears, a letter to her, to thank her for contacting me, and a letter to him, asking her to read it, telling him I love him, that I'll always cherish the time I spent with him in Verona back in '85, that I'm well, that I'm protesting the war, all wars, that he'd probably not want to know that, being a retired Army man, but I wrote it to give him a chuckle, or get a rise, and that I have a good job, a good apartment, and my cats and I are healthy and happy. It's not all lies. And that I hope he is not in pain, is not suffering, and I love that he's a fighter, I am too, but at some point he must give in and be at peace. I don't know what else to say to him. I want to know about my mother, and their childhood on the shores of Lake Michigan, I want to know about their grandfather, and our heritage, and their mother, my grandmother, and about what it was like when he was in the Army, and how did he accept his wife having a lover all these years, and was living apart the best way, and why did they stay together, and who is going to be my family now, and why don't my cousins stay in touch with me, don't they care? This was a surprise. I feel like I'm running out of time here, like there was time to consider what I'd write to him next, and on what stationery and would I mail it, or would I send email again, and how would I know how he is, but now I know. Now, I know. Cost of the War in Iraq
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