Uncle Craig

This December is my Uncle Craig’s 50th birthday. My grandma asked that I put together a short memory of him, which she’ll put together with those of everyone else in the family. I should be safe posting this because I don’t think Craig visits my blog, but if you are reading, Craig—stop now, because it will ruin your birthday present.

An uncle is one of those characters in the story of your life who you seem to have a lot of contact with when you’re a kid, then gradually less and less as you get older. Perhaps a big part of that is being the child of an older sibling—my mom is two years older than Craig—because, I was around before Uncle Craig even got a chance to start and become occupied with a family of his own.

I was born the day after my Uncle Craig’s birthday and I’m his first and only nephew, so naturally we have an innate kinship that no mere neice (or sister of mine, to be more specific) could even get close to.

With his birthday two days after Christmas and mine a day after that, Craig taught me the fine art of disallowing relatives to consolidate Christmas and birthday gifts. One essential tactic is to let everyone know that you demand your birthday presents be wrapped with birthday paper—NOT Christmas paper. You can also drop hints to suggest segregational gift buying—“I heard such and such will be 30 percent off at the after-christmas sale, etc.”

Another trick, which I don’t remember ever seeing Craig do, but had proved to be somewhat effective for me is to casually start a “so, did you get everything you wanted for Christmas” conversation with a family member—the items you lamentably list in those few well invested minutes serve as a perfectly placed subtle reminder of what’s still available for them to get you.

I always heard other kids complaining about having their birthdays so close to Christmas, but I don’t remember ever feeling that way. To some kids, the Christmas-time-birthdays were a burden, but thanks to the wisdom and tutorage of my dear uncle Craig, for me it was like a three-day, happiness-insurance policy.

I can remember as a kid, you could always count on Uncle Craig to get you the presents you were really hoping for, but were too extravagant for even Santa Claus to bring you. One year it was Hotwheels’ slot-car racers; another year, He-Man’s Castle Greyskull; and a Kermit the Frog party another year. I don’t know how he always knew exactly what I wanted, but when it came to pulling through with the ideal gift, he was as reliable as Steve Largent’s hands on a sideline catch.

With Uncle Craig, it didn’t matter whether it was Christmas day, my birthday, or any given Thursday—he’d have some little prize to give me every time I saw him. I became so accustomed to it that I began to expect something with every visit. I can still remember the first time he didn’t have anything.

My four-year-old self asked him what he’d brought me.

He answered, “a kiss on the cheek.”

I gave him a sly grin (as sly as four-year-old chubby cheeks can get) and I gazed at him from the corner of my eye thinking, Aw, that Uncle Craig is such a great kidder. So, I slugged him one and said, “No really, whadja bring me?”

He wasn’t joking! I couldn’t believe it. I can remember feeling a little upset about the fact that his perfect record had been tainted, but I also remember looking at my two little sisters (who did receive little Uncle Craig trinkets) and thinking (or at least feeling), I guess I’m just not a little kid anymore.

In third or fourth grade, Uncle Craig had gone on a trip somewhere—I don’t remember where he’d gone, but—when he came back, he brought four gold bracelets with him and he gave one each to me and my sisters. The three of them loved ‘em and wouldn’t take them off for weeks, but I did not approve and I confronted him about it. “Bracelets are for girls! What am I gonna do with this?” He suggested I hang on to it for a while and that sooner or later, I’d find a girl that I wanted to give it to. I found that preposterous—“Me? Like a girl? Ha!” But you know, about two years later as Rick Pettibone and I were staring at Nicole Boyer from across the 4-square court, talking about how gorgeous she was, I realized that my Uncle Craig was right. How was it that he knew what I would want—even before I knew? This was even more amazing than the surprise Castle Greyskull play set.

My High school years were some of the greatest of my life, and I attribute much of that fun to football. I love football. I loved playing it, I loved the lifelong friends I made, and I loved the unique experience of walking out under the lights with my teammates, before a cheering crowd of our peers with one united purpose in mind—to inflict pain on our opponents.

My class and the class before me weren’t very deep with athletic talent, so our teams weren’t really dominating throughout the league. Each year it came down to one game that would determine whether we’d advance to the playoffs. My junior year it was sad to have lost that game, but my senior year it was devastating. I knew probably wouldn’t play college ball, so this would be the last time I’d ever strap on a helmet. This was the last time Bryant, Peterson, Anderson and Hall would walk out along the 50-yard line to call the coin toss before a game.

I remember our last game—it was late October. When the game was over and the bus brought the team back to the school, all the girls from our group of friends were there to cheer us on, even though we’d lost, but I couldn’t help but bury my face and sob. I knew my football days were over and I had nothing to remember it by—no championship, no trophy—just the memory of losing my last game.

The following December the 24th, our family met with the Elton side at Grampa Larry’s—same as we do every year. Margo served a great meal, complete with her patented green salad with raisins. My sisters, my cousins and I ate at the kids table, as usual. Then, just like always, we took our places on the sofa and the floor around the tree to unwrap our presents.

Everything was typical: a fancy sweater from Grampa and Margo, Mom blabbing on and on about how each gift she received “would go just perfect” with this outfit or that, but when I opened my present from Uncle Craig the predictability stopped. It was a photo album of shots he’d taken from the sidelines from each of my football games that season. It was like an NFL Films highlight reel starring me. It was a collection of photos of everything I’d loved and everything I wanted to remember from my limited time playing my favorite sport.

I kept my composure as I told him “thanks,” but once the presents were all unwrapped and everyone retired to the kitchen for dessert, I lingered in the living room and discreetly cried as I thumbed through the pictures and relived the moments—moments that had only recently passed, but that I had feared were at risk of being forgotten.
How did he know what I wanted? I never told him, and I’m not even sure that I new myself. How did he know? How has he always known? I couldn’t tell you how, but I can tell you this, that even though an Uncle’s role becomes less and less involved in your life the older you get, his interest and his affection remain.