Memorial Day

I once had a great uncle. When I was a boy, he was my favorite uncle. I called him Unk. Unk was a retired New York City policeman. He was short, beefy and bald with short stubby fingers and although my mother liked him, she thought he was “course” as people once called those with rough edges.

A bachelor, Unk had a girl friend, Margaret. She worked at Western Union. They dated, including occasionally going to bars to have drinks.  Unk lived with his two pious Methodist sisters who, with icy resignation, barely tolerated his ways- the drinking but also that Margaret was both Irish and Catholic.  Margaret never made any appearances at family occasions.

To this day I have his billy club. It has no nicks or dents.  Unk, a diamond in the rough, had a good heart and my guess is, he never used the club in earnest.

I think of him often, especially around Memorial Day. He assumed the care of the family gravesite. It was small, located at the old Moravian Cemetery on Staten Island. The plot sat in a stand of lovely old beech trees. Among great aunts and uncles, my parents are buried there.

On occasion he’d take me with him to care for the site. It was a ritual of remembering I enjoyed. He’d mow the small patch of grass, meticulously trim around the headstones and have me weed at the edges of the plot. He’d plant flowers, water them while standing in silent reflection, and then, before leaving, light up one of his Old Gold cigarettes, which signaled to me that the ritual was over.  I recognized the tender caring in this ritual of remembering that bespoke gentleness in him that I treasured. I wondered when after he died who’d look after the site.

On Memorial Day here on the Shore, between cookouts, there will be occasions of remembering at gravesites.  We will remember those who gave their lives in service to their country. Acts of remembrance have significant spiritual power. They are often regarded as activities kindred to praying. To remember someone  in mourning is to communicate to them comfort and offer them strength. To hold someone deceased in our thoughts is to honor their memory and in a mystical sort of way, to invite them out of the past to join us in the present. It’s a gesture of thanksgiving for their lives. I’m particularly fond of how Quakers put this; to pray or to carry someone in remembrance is to “hold them in the light.”

Calling to mind those friends’ and relatives who have predeceased us is in part to acknowledge the role they played in making us the persons we are today.

In my studio, in the corner, I can see Unk’s billy club leaning against the wall. The club is dark mahogany, smooth and shiny as if brand new. As I look at this instrument of control, ironically, I think, not of its potential for violence, but recall the spirit of gentleness that Unk left to me as his legacy. It’s worth remembering.