Baby Boomer Sagas's Blog

Excerpt from: “Uncle Mike”, Chapter II | May 14, 2010

Mike and Me 1951

10/28/11 – Here is an excerpt from “Uncle Mike” .  It is my earliest recollection:

How far back can you remember? What is your earliest recollection? Experts seem to believe we cannot recall infancy. Do you remember being in the womb, going through the birth canal, or your christening?

I recall an episode that occurred when I was eighteen months old at the house on Cook Street. It was a special moment for me and it was with my Uncle Mike. Although my mom told me that my uncle used to play with me often while I was in my crib, I can only remember this single incident.

My bedroom was the size of a matchbox—eight feet by nine. The room had one tall narrow window. I can recall my crib, with its vertical wooden slats spaced just far enough apart for a baby to easily poke its head between them. They didn’t have the stringent child safety regulations that we have now.

And it was in this room that I remember Mike. He was the one adult who made me laugh and who laughed with me so hard that I couldn’t help but feel the joy of infancy. He would burn a memory into my tiny brain that would remain with me forever.

I was lying on my back with my head in the direction of the bedroom door. The crib was positioned up against the wall which was to my left. Mike was on my right leaning over the crib railing looking down at me with this silly grin on his face and an unconcealed look of anticipation.

He dangled a length of string that resembled butcher’s yarn, in his right hand, and he lowered it so it was just within my grasp. I instinctively reacted as a child does during this kind of playful scenario and stretched my seven-inch arms way up high to grab it. My sugar-plumb-sized hands had just about touched that string, and then it was gone with lightening speed. Up, up, the string traveled, yanked from my reach in a flash.

My face said it all and it was like a trigger was squeezed for Mike. Pow! He emitted an explosion of laughter. He was laughing hard; it sounded like a continuous giggle. His face scrunched up, his eyes held that mischievous look, and his mouth spread across his face. Oh, how I remember that laugh.

He was having a blast, not because I couldn’t reach the string, but because after my shock wore off, I started laughing with him. The joy was mutual and we were having so much fun.

Mike would continue to be a loving figure in my life up until the time he collapsed on his bedroom floor during the early evening of September 9, 1987. He left a wife and two teenage sons behind. 

This would be my first loss of a loved one who would take a part of me with them. It wouldn’t be the last piece of my life that would go in that same way. Family would be the most important thing for me. It would become a factor in every decision I made, even if at the time I was completely unaware of its influence.