For as long as I’ve lived, I’ve had two Uncle Jerrys.
Uncle Jerry with a J is my father’s brother.
Uncle Gerry with a G married my mom’s sister.
At some point in his life, my Uncle Gerry with a G began using his first name, rather than his middle name, and people started calling him Kay, but not us. Oh, no. He was always Uncle Gerry, and in tandem, it was always Mardi and Gerry when we talked about our California family.
Why were we never directed to start calling him Uncle Kay? I mean, that would have made things a lot less confusing on the uncle front. But we called him Uncle Gerry until the day he died.
That day was July 9th.
My Uncle Gerry was a dentist. When I was a little girl, this fact meant his character was suspect. Trips to the dentist had proven full of empty promises, (This will only take a second! You won’t feel a thing!) Promises which caused me to lock myself in the car after my mom had gotten out, so I wouldn’t have to go into the dentist's office. (A dark day for us both.) This early suspicion of dentists meant that whenever I was around my Uncle Gerry, I watched closely to see if he fit the stereotype I had come to believe.
On one of our trips to California to visit, it was announced that we would have dental checkups. I was not happy. I remember Uncle Gerry asking me what scared me so much. I’m not sure how I answered, but he must have surmised that it boiled down to fear of the unknown, because the next day when we went to his office, (he held my hand, most likely because he had heard about the car incident and didn’t want me to bolt into the street.) He explained every little thing to me before it happened. I knew exactly what to expect. And I learned that I could trust my Uncle Gerry.
Uncle Gerry had a much louder spirit than my father’s quiet presence. He was also a dad who worked in the city, and my dad worked in the country. His backyard included a pool, and our farmyard included a fast-flowing irrigation canal. They seemed polar-opposite, but when they got together, they talked about faith. The Lord. Family. I learned what really mattered to these men who had both married Mallory girls from Shelley, Idaho, was their love for the Lord and their love for their families. They weren't so different after all.
When my grandmother (his mother-in-law) passed away, I remember Uncle Gerry taking photos at the funeral and the cemetery, and I thought how strange it was to take photos at a time that was so sad. I asked him why, and he taught me something meaningful with his answer. He said, “Cameras are for capturing the significant moments, not just the happy ones.”
A few days before my wedding, my Uncle Gerry and Aunt Mardi showed up at the farm to help us prepare. Out came my uncle’s camera, and as chaos ensued, my aunt and uncle insisted on capturing all of it on film. Those photos of my parents spiffing up the place for guests and making last-minute alterations to my wedding dress are priceless to me now.
A few years later, Uncle Gerry and Aunt Mardi served at the Jerusalem Center. Uncle Gerry helped to organize the Center tours given to thousands of visitors each year, and it was his beautiful speaking voice that first narrated the introduction video shown to those thousands of visitors.
While they were serving in Jerusalem, Elder Faust called the director, Kent Brown, and asked if someone could take a photo of the ancient keys displayed behind the Franciscan tailor shop in the Old City. Dr. Brown found Uncle Gerry and told him to grab his camera and they went in search of the keys. Uncle Gerry’s photos were included in Elder Faust’s next conference talk on the importance of priesthood keys.
Uncle Gerry and Aunt Mardi were there, taking photos at the funerals of my mother, my brother, and my father. Somber, still, to look upon, but oh so precious to me.
By the time our children were marrying, both my parents were heavenside, but Uncle Gerry and Aunt Mardi traveled far to attend for them, and they took photos then, too.
The year I wrote daily on social media about my mother to celebrate what would have been her 90th birthday, Uncle Gerry read every post, and then he would write to me about a memory it had brought up or about a discussion it had begun between him and Mardi. I keep his words of encouragement close for times when I need some bolstering.
Yesterday at his funeral, I learned something I didn’t know about him. When he was a young boy, he played the trumpet. He was hired to play at the funerals of the soldiers who were being brought home from the war to be laid to rest. He was told to go to the farthest corner of the cemetery where he wouldn’t be seen and wait for the 21-gun salute, and after the last rounds were fired, he was to play Taps from his waiting place. That is what he did. For 25 cents, he rode his bike to the cemetery and played Taps for who knows how many families.
I never got to visit with him about this. I would have liked to hear the story from him and ask if that was why he was so attuned to the feelings of grief at cemeteries, because he had witnessed, firsthand, those moments that captured the significance of a life, ended.
As we made our way to the cemetery after the funeral, members of the Veteran’s Administration were there to ceremoniously remove the flag from his casket, and with great care, to fold it and present it to the family. But what the family did not know, was that a trumpeter stood quietly off to the side by the hedge. When those 24 melancholy notes of Taps began to sound through the warm summertime silence, I could not hold back the tears. I reached for my phone to capture the moment, but then I looked at the crowd. So many of his posterity were already on task. They were following in his footsteps, capturing the significance of the moment.
I’m sure he was there, watching from heaven, tucked quietly out of sight as he’d been as a boy, and I think he smiled to see those cameras come out.
He has trained them well.
In his emails to me, he would sign them, “Kay (aka Uncle Gerry)” but in his last email, he had finally given up hope that I’d ever get with the program, and he signed it, “Uncle Gerry (aka Kay).” I think it means when I get to heaven, I won’t have to apologize when I call him Uncle Gerry. I’ve already been given permission from Uncle Gerry with a G.
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