Uncle Randy

I have a lot of memories of my Uncle Randy. This one is my favorite. I didn't really like staying the night away from home very much when I was little, even if I was staying at my grandparents house. I remember one weekend I was visiting my grandparents and was feeling really homesick, because for whatever the reason, I was there with out my sister, who normally was with me on these trips. I don't remember how young I actually was, but I remember that I felt my saddest at night going to sleep, and in the morning waking up. I would lay there in bed forever, until I would finally hear someone else awake.

One morning I woke up to the sound of someone in the kitchen, it was my uncle Randy. I'm pretty sure he was in college at the time, but he was living with my grandparents. Randy was a notorious cool dude. He didn't cook, he always had a girl on his arm and a cool car out front. Always had places to go people to see. Not this morning though. As I stumbled my little sleepy self into the kitchen there was Uncle Randy, making pancakes. Not just making pancakes, making ME pancakes. As he fixed me a plate he told me to be super quiet, so that we didn't wake up my grandparents. I don't really remember or care what we laughed and talked about that morning, because I was sure of all the nieces and nephews, I was the one who Uncle Randy had ever made pancakes for.

After we finished breakfast Uncle Randy let me help him wash his Red corvette. The coolest car in the whole world. When it was cleaned to perfection, Uncle Randy took me for a drive. Again I don't remember much about that drive, just that I was the luckiest kid in the whole world.

My Uncle Randy's favorite band was Genesis, he loved Peter Gabriel, The Eagles, and U2. Sarah Maclachan's I will Remember You is the song that my aunt chose to play at his memorial service when he died in 1999. Green Day's Time of Your Life was the song that played as we pulled up to the funeral home. Daniel, though, is the song that fills my mind with thoughts of my Uncle Randy more than any other.

You see, he committed suicide. I'll never really understand why. So when I heard Daniel on the radio, not long after he died, it just got me. It still gets me, even just listening to this little clip. I guess when I think of him leaving this earth, I don't picture his suicide. I picture him all those years ago, dropping me off at my grandparents house after our drive. I see his hand waving out the window as he drove away, leaving me feeling like the luckiest kid in the world.