Memories

 6 November 2020

 My Uncle Bill

 

My Uncle Bill Huber passed this week.  I have been digging deep into my memories of the man to see what is there.  Inside my head’s vault of the past there are three distinct groups of memories.  One group predates 1960, this was the period when my Mom was teaching and my Aunt Sugar was providing daycare for me.  Back then it was Billy and Jimmy and me. Dot, Mel and John would come later.

 

Most of my memories of that time were of Aunt Sugar, Bill’s wife.  But there are some distinct memories I have of Uncle Bill.  Mostly they are of a man with a measured tone.  I think his role as a mortician imposed a calm demeanor for his dealings with the public in general. His quiet demeanor carried over to his dealings with me.  I know I was confused about his outfits.  He wore dark suits and ties on day that were not Sundays.  What was that about thought my four-year-old brain.  Most men in my life were blue collar factory rats. They were suits on Sunday.  But Uncle Bill would have to put on the dark suit and subdued tie uniform during the week. This aberration from the norm of men in my world that flummoxed my thinking.  Again, he was always a genial man and a calm force during these years.

 

The second group of memories come from a period of time involved the years after the Hubers had moved to Bordentown but before I spent my summers in Ocean City, NJ.  Bill would on major family occasions such as Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day would drive down in a big black Cadillac that he had because of his funeral home business.  His growing family would spill out at my Grandmother’s house or the houses of my aunts and uncles’. The arrival was cacophonous. He was always laughing and he always had a smile. And he would come prepared and would make homemade ice cream. If you want to win hearts and minds of the preteen set, make homemade ice cream.  

 

My final group of memories come from the years when I was in my early teens. Yes, I know my Uncle Bill was a Mason and a semi-professional clown, but I really didn’t know much about those parts of his life.  What I did know was that on those days he could steal away from the funeral home he loved being at the beach, by and in the water.  I am pretty sure it was my Uncle Bill and Aunt Sugar who convinced my parents that Ocean City was a great place to rent an apartment for the summer.  Good God, I wish I could thank him for that bit of persuasion.  The beach changed my life, my mind, my values and my world view.  I remember well my Uncle Bill sitting in a beach chair down by the water just reveling in the warmth of summertime. Me, I am pretty sure he would not mind being remembered that way.  There is some joy of a vision of a man in his prime letting the sea breeze tousle his hair as he sat by the never changing, but always changeable, Atlantic.