Tuesday, May 4, 2010
I always wanted to be like my uncle.
He was a genuinely nice guy who played sports in high school, was great fun at cook-outs and didn't have much patience for baloney. Not one for baby talk or cuteness, he never condescended to kids but never treated us like mini-adults either.
He had a rather appealing sense of humor as well. For example, to him, entertaining Christmas or birthday gifts for toddlers were the ones that made the most noise, thereby driving his sister and brother-in-law the most crazy. Were there a fraternity for Finders of Really Obnoxious Toy Lawnmowers, he would have been grand master. I aspired to that level of adult evil.
He also was a smart guy who sported horn-rimmed glasses and a crew-cut, went to a Catholic college nobody knew about, drove a Falcon and became a chemist. Imagine your horror when you discover that in the Year of Our Lord 1957, little girls didn't wear horn-rimmed glasses, but blue, wingy things with rhinestones. The crew-cut was impossible from the start and Falcons were out of the picture by the time driving age came, though it took chemistry a while longer to depart.
Chemistry was really cool because you got to use test tubes and mix substances with names you couldn't pronounce to make wild things happen. So he bought the kiddy-chem set as his sister gritted her teeth.
Being a science man, he was really good at homework. There was the time we were supposed to come up with a simple experiment for Sister Someone-or-Other. "How about a galvanic reaction?" asked he, which elicited a gigantic "Huh?" He suggested wadding up aluminum foil and asking the nun to chew on it, after which she would describe the result on her dental fillings. That would be a galvanic reaction, all right.
Sadly, we settled for something about capillary action that involved sugar cubes and dyed water, and such was the extent of my involvement in the sciences, having discovered as an adolescent that before you can do all those great experiments, you have to know how to figure out atomic weights and balance equations. Alas, a parting of the ways, my head being a math-free zone.
He treated us no differently as young adults and adults. His gifts, and our late aunt's, always seemed to be things we really wanted or would actually wear or carry. A beautiful embroidered shirt lasted all the way through high school and into college. It probably still is around here somewhere.
His reaction to my choice of universities -- a small Catholic institution nobody knew about --was typical. It went something like, "Great, but you know it's really cold in Milwaukee." The response went something like, "Not as cold as it is in Olean." He ended up helping me book my first airline flight, even if it was from a place at which Jesuits, not Franciscans, were in charge.
Later, after that college ring was lost beneath the floor of a great-aunt's not-so-great house and the result was an unholy snit, he clambered under the creepy place to retrieve it. What wasn't lost on me was that that ring probably wouldn't have been there in the first place but for his example. It probably wasn't lost on him, either, that I would think of him every time I put it on henceforth.
His influence remained as strong as ever in adulthood.
He was still a really interesting guy who once had an office in midtown Manhattan, which evokes a green-tinged reaction to this day, and later was involved in the manufacture and sales of fragrances that went into everyday things. He used to give us samples with names like "Fresh, Clean Scent," which would become a well-known soap brand; and "Scent Number 44," which would become a famed cologne. That was exceptionally cool.
Not everything about his life was cool, though. Our uncle and aunt became parents later than they'd hoped, and when they did, they did well, with three great children. Then cancer claimed our aunt far too soon, leaving her husband a trio of young kids to look after, as well as the high-level job, the house and the rest. So he did what came naturally and succeeded magnificently.
He set up a home-operated business that flourished; a massive achievement in the age before the Internet. Years later, after his niece asked him how he managed to do so undisturbed, he answered, "I moved to the cellar and I lock the door." In Florida, we don't have cellars, but I do lock the door.
He was better known for opening doors, though. Singularly devoted to Salve Regina University, where all his offspring studied, he ended up moving from New Jersey to Rhode Island in order to play a greater role in it. He was social, but not really a socialite, certainly not one of those "take my picture" types that we journalists find so cringe-inducing. He raised remarkably successful children who also are remarkably good people. How non-surprising.
On the morning of April 25, Don Staff died.
He was far too young, but went as most people would hope to go: quickly, with little pain, less fuss and lots of loved ones around him. He will continue to mean much to two institutions that meant so much to him: Franciscan order and Salve Regina. His children already are discussing a legacy made real: a scholarship fund. They're just like him. Wish I were.
I always will want to be like my uncle.
