Jack

For some reason this morning I was thinking about an uncle of mine who died in the late 1980's. He was a nut! Alcoholism contributed to some of that but even completely sober he was a nut. I remember sadly that when his daughter, who is the same age as me, was in Jr. High. A school counselor talked to her and told her to put 3 things in order of how she felt things were important to her father. She listed #1 work #2 alcohol #3 family. In a way since I've grown I can see that because he worked everyday, even being an alcoholic, showing up daily and being a productive worker, he was doing that for his family. When he died he had insurance on everything so all his debts were immediately paid. So his family was higher on the list than she thought.
When he died he was in his car, not far from home, driving to the cemetery on Christmas Eve to put a battery powered Christmas tree on his parent's grave. He had a heart attack at the wheel and ran straight into a tree. When we got the call my parents went straight to his home. His wife is my dad's sister. He and my dad worked together with at least two of my other uncles. I stayed home and the phone kept ringing. Apparently his death had been announced over the local radio and men he worked with were calling our house. I'd answer and these grown men would be crying on the other end asking me if it was true.
The company my husband works for and the company my dad works for merged and everything was moved to one facility. So now my husband works with all these men that once knew my uncle Jack. My husband said he's like a legend or something! He still hears stories about him over 20 years later!
My Aunt told me once that they had a telephone number just one number off from the local country music station and they continually got phone calls for song requests. When my uncle would answer he' d say "what do you want to hear?" and when they'd put in their request he'd sing the song loud and proud.
My Dad and he went Christmas shopping once and Jack decided my Aunt needed a bra and kept telling my dad "come here, you try it on. If it fits you it'll fit her!" and tried his hardest to get my dad to put that bra on in the store.
When the men would get together outside of work to help a friend bale hay or something like that here would come Jack with doughnuts and orange juice for everyone.
Once for Christmas I remember he gave me a bunch of little Avon bottles of perfume, the year he died I believe.
One time he was drunk and the cops went to his house and he told the cop if he came up on his porch he'd throw him right back down. The cop came up. Jack threw him right off.
He was very kind and thoughtful. Alcohol was a terrible problem in his whole family. His father drank and all his siblings. It's a sad thing. The Christmas tree on his parent's grave wasn't the only decoration he put on there. At Easter he decorated with a plastic blown up rabbit! Can you imagine! What men think of doing stuff like that for their long dead parent's!