Uncle Tommy, The Uncomplicated
Because I am teaching The Odyssey, I have epithets on my mind. I’ve had my ninth graders writing their own epic narratives for years, but it’s only recently that I have become fixated on the power of the epithet. I’m only thousands of years late on this. Homer was all over it, of course.
This morning a student emailed asking if she could name her epic hero “Sisu the Sorrowful”, and I am just delighted because that name does the job it was meant to do. It’s made me so curious about Sisu’s journey. And she managed that beautiful alliteration. And now I realize I have also, unconsciously, added some alliterative rhythm to mine for Uncle Tommy.
I haven’t reached out to my six cousins about the loss of their father yet, and it has been weeks. The reason for my not reaching out is a little complicated. First, there are six of them. That’s a lot of busy adults to track down. Where to even begin. A funeral would have been a starting point, but his was kept “small” because of Covid, I believe. But small for the McCarthys means there would have been something like thirteen grandchildren, many of whom are married with their own children. I think there are at least ten great-grandchildren. The fact that I can’t be sure about the numbers tells you all you need to know. It’s a big family. There can be no small funeral.
It’s also a little complicated because I am younger than each of my McCarthy cousins, and even though I am nearing fifty years old, I can still feel a little like the younger cousin in their presence. A little intimidated, I guess. Not that the McCarthys are intimidating. I always think of them as almost otherworldly in their gentleness. This otherworldly gentleness is in my dad, my Uncle Dick, my Aunt Clare, and in all six of her children. It was in my Pop-Pop, too. Gentle jokes. Gentle smiles. I am not saying they are saintly, but I am saying you will never hear a McCarthy say something cruel or nasty. You will never feel aggression or passive aggression. At least I never have. And I have long been a close observer of them because close observing has always been my thing, ever since I was a very young child back on Comly Street, next to Uncle Tommy who sat in the cream-colored leather (maybe vinyl) chair that was on the wall between Pop Pop’s recliner and the cabinet-style television. In the corner, there was a globe liquor cabinet that I spotted in my cousin Tommy’s apartment when I was in my twenties. Tommy junior, that is. The cream-colored chair was stitched with little metal beads. I can feel my fingers tracing the beads even now.
It is hard to say if Uncle Tommy sat on that chair in my presence dozens of times or just a few that have stayed with me. I would have been somewhere between ages four and six. I remember being positioned on the floor between him and my Pop-Pop who lounged with his Budweiser on the recliner. I am sure I chose that place on the floor because that was the spot nearest the fun and affection. Uncle Tommy would tease me and my brothers and call us “turkeys” and Pop Pop would speak to us in a nonsense language. In other words, they created a world of pure joy for my five-year-old self. Uncle Tommy was always smiling. Always in tune with the children. Always kind.
I have used the epithet ironically. Obviously, there are no uncomplicated or saintly humans. Even among the McCarthys. There came a time when Uncle Tommy was no longer with our clan. There was a divorce which makes me sad even right now because the thought of it interferes with the purity of my visceral memories of his kind and loving nature. Not to say that kind and loving people don’t divorce, obviously, they do. But when you are a child and it’s the first divorce you hear about, and it involves people you idolize, it is hard to integrate that reality with the purity of the memories. And in those years of the complications, I was far too young to have the capacity to say to any of my cousins or to my aunt and uncle how sorry I was for their broken hearts. But I was so sorry and confused.
In later years, after the period of confusion, there came a time when I would see Uncle Tommy and his second wife, Dee, at family gatherings. Dee seemed just as gentle as my aunt and my cousins. Uncle Tommy, it seems, had wonderful taste in women. In those years, I sometimes wondered if I was still supposed to call Uncle Tommy “uncle” since he wasn’t technically my uncle anymore. But the question was answered when upon seeing him, “uncle” would just roll off my tongue and all the feelings of deep affection returned without interruption.
I wish I could add a photo of Uncle Tommy on the cream-colored chair to this piece. I wish I could show you his playful eyes and his sweet smile that pop up so easily on each of his children’s faces. Instead, I will leave you with the view from 414 Comly Street. It’s the baseball field across the street from my grandparents’ house. The house where Uncle Tommy played a starring role in all my memories of the 4th of July fireworks, and in the Sunday dinners with Pop Pop tearing up whenever he would look out and see his children and grandchildren gathered around for grace, Mom-Mom making huge dinners in the tiny kitchen, Uncle Dick with all of his tricks and tales…all of us happy.
No one is uncomplicated. But some of us have so much love in our lives that we have the blessing of many uncomplicated and happy childhood memories. At the center of my most uncomplicated and happy memories, Uncle Tommy is alive and well. And this is what I want my cousins, Aunt Clare, and Dee to know. This is what would have been on my heart had I been able to embrace them by the casket.
