Post by Fran on Jul 13, 2003 23:41:49 GMT -5
Wendell Camp was the finest, jolliest, most generous person I've ever known. He never visited, or met you that he didn't have a pound of sausage, or pecans for your freezer. He loved to barbecue, and was, in his youth a fine race driver. Later in life he loved taking tickets, or just running errands at the dirt track where his friends raced. Didn't get paid, mind you, for much of anything. He was retired, and basically the kind of guy that lived to help his friends. He never married or had children. We were his children. He gave me his refridgerator and dryer when I bought my new house at age 23. Never mind that he didn't really need new ones -- down to Sears he went, and up to my house with 1000.00 of appliances I would have had to do without. He gave my brother his first stereo, and my cousin a chance at his first real job. He welcomed my aunt and her two teenagers to live with him for months while their dad was selling the house back West and arranging for his retirment from the Navy. While she lived, he cared as lovingly for our grandmother, his mom, as anyone has ever done. When she passed, it broke his heart, and as far as I can tell, it never quite mended.
Two weeks ago, I spent the day with Wendell and my folks. We attended a funeral for one of their aged relations. We ate lunch out, and came on back to the house. We laughed a lot, and teased each other a good bit. I handed him a bowl of strawberry ice cream. After a while, he got up and went on home. Mom talked to him around 6:30 that night: he said he had got out of his suit into some shorts, and that he was going to eat himself a sandwich. That was Wednesday.
Sunday, his 67th birthday, Wendell didn't show up to eat breakfast with his buddies. Turns out that Mom, Dad and I were probably the last people to see him alive, and Mom was the last ever to speak to him.
Someone went to Wendell's little house. Someone bad. The sheriff's office says they have suspects. All I know is that Wendell is gone.
Everyone likes to improve the character of their dead relatives. Even the honestest people have minisiters swear to the holiness of the most blackhearted relative. This isn''t like that. Wendell was the real deal. He loved people, and they loved him. Period. Taking him out of this world was like going to a museum and picking out the finest, most expressive piece of art there and annihilating it. Destroying something that had no function but to bring beauty and enlightenment and enjoyment to others. That is what they did when they hurt him. He was our Santa, every year but one. And when he visited our other relatives that one Xmas, we cried. Not for anything he might give us -- for the joyousness of his heart. It seemed awful to our child minds that he wouldn't always be there to tease Mom, give the dog bits of ham and mix the dressing. Now he'll never do any of it again.
I was the one who was in line to help Wendell as he got old. All that was done for me, I hoped to do for him. And as awful as the idea is that my uncle died alone, afraid and in pain, it is worse to me that I've been robbed of the chance to do everything in my power to ensure that his last years were happy. I failed him, and I can never forget it.
Two weeks ago, I spent the day with Wendell and my folks. We attended a funeral for one of their aged relations. We ate lunch out, and came on back to the house. We laughed a lot, and teased each other a good bit. I handed him a bowl of strawberry ice cream. After a while, he got up and went on home. Mom talked to him around 6:30 that night: he said he had got out of his suit into some shorts, and that he was going to eat himself a sandwich. That was Wednesday.
Sunday, his 67th birthday, Wendell didn't show up to eat breakfast with his buddies. Turns out that Mom, Dad and I were probably the last people to see him alive, and Mom was the last ever to speak to him.
Someone went to Wendell's little house. Someone bad. The sheriff's office says they have suspects. All I know is that Wendell is gone.
Everyone likes to improve the character of their dead relatives. Even the honestest people have minisiters swear to the holiness of the most blackhearted relative. This isn''t like that. Wendell was the real deal. He loved people, and they loved him. Period. Taking him out of this world was like going to a museum and picking out the finest, most expressive piece of art there and annihilating it. Destroying something that had no function but to bring beauty and enlightenment and enjoyment to others. That is what they did when they hurt him. He was our Santa, every year but one. And when he visited our other relatives that one Xmas, we cried. Not for anything he might give us -- for the joyousness of his heart. It seemed awful to our child minds that he wouldn't always be there to tease Mom, give the dog bits of ham and mix the dressing. Now he'll never do any of it again.
I was the one who was in line to help Wendell as he got old. All that was done for me, I hoped to do for him. And as awful as the idea is that my uncle died alone, afraid and in pain, it is worse to me that I've been robbed of the chance to do everything in my power to ensure that his last years were happy. I failed him, and I can never forget it.