TWENTY-FIVE SEEMED OLDER BACK THEN

His keys and wallet on the silver tray and his leather jacket waits for him to come home, like a puppy waits for his master. Shivers up the spine with the scream of sirens. He was supposed to meet up with friends. Instead he met up with a truck. The driver couldn’t see over a snow drift.

Meanwhile, i have come home from my first time skiing. With rose red cheeks,
I dress for bed and solidly hit the pillow. It’s been an exciting night for a seventeen year old. Can’t wait to tell mom about my great adventure.

I wake up to crying, my mom alongside my bed. I can tell by her weeping -someone has died. I assume it is probably my grandfather.

When mom tells me her 25 year old brother has died in a car accident, my brain refuses to process the information, it doesn’t make sense.

As we drive the eight hours to attend a funeral, I wonder what it will be like. Will people be crying?

I don’t remember the first hours of our arrival. We tend to remember the time spent with our peers. So, it is with my cousins.

I touch my uncle’s cold arm and memorize his green suit. My younger cousin cries, but her older brother handles death by cracking jokes. I don’t recall what they were, but know we all laughed. We laughed so hard, humor tears were shed. We all walked out to the parking lot, feeling a bit better at the release
Of heavy emotions.

Oh how we loved our uncle. He loved to embarrass and to tease. I still remember how his face lit up and his smile. At seventeen, you remember such things.

A picture of his shattered car creeps up on the television. Sinks in that he is dead. Twenty-five seemed older back then.

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