From: Beaver_Fever@live.com   
      
   He would have been 61 today. It's hard to imagine him being old even though he   
   was always old to me. He certainly never grew up at least in the sense most of   
   us associate with adulthood and maturity.   
      
   He lived a short and sometimes troubled life. Like my mother and most of her   
   siblings he grew up in foster homes. My father would sometimes derisively say   
   he was the one relative who I took after the most. He was rarely employed and   
   aside from a three-   
   year stint in the navy, often lived with us. He was something of a loner and   
   may have had what would be more politely called amotivational syndrome today.   
      
   When he went into the navy, I was about 7 years old. He left his records in my   
   room and I listened to them often. It included many of the staples of FM rock   
   radio of the 1970's. They more than anything have formed the core of my   
   musical tastes today as I    
   could also dig deeper beyond what I was hearing on the radio as well as offer   
   me a more socially accepted version of escapism than playing with Star Wars   
   toys. I still have them.  Like some of the artists in the record collection he   
   also died at age 27.   
      
   Always barefoot and with long hair, omnipresent cigarette smoke, the other   
   funny smelling cigarette smoke coming from the car when he would get together   
   with Uncle Brian (also deceased and a much more complicated tale that may   
   someday be told),    
   irreverent humor coupled with his unique laugh, which I am now desperately   
   trying to recall the sound of, are what I will always associate with him. I   
   remember the pitch and feel but not the actual sound.   
      
   His only attempt at mentoring that I recall was in 8th grade to tell me I   
   should try talking to girls at school. My parents and friends weren't much   
   help in this regard so perhaps my own personal life might have taken a   
   difference course had he not soon    
   disappeared from my life.   
      
   But I can't necessarily say he was what would be considered a "good" role   
   model. He would often let me stay home from school and call in masquerading as   
   a parent in exchange for my lunch money. It was one such day when we both saw   
   the Space Shuttle    
   Challenger disaster live on television and were trying to comprehend what we   
   were seeing. When I first started smoking pot his absence was deeply felt as I   
   wished we could have shared the experience.    
      
   It was at a low point in his life when he died in an accident, the details of   
   which are still shrouded in mystery, so his situation was by no means   
   permanent or the type of end associated with a downward spiral. It took me   
   until I was past age 40 to    
   begin to find my way after a protracted adolescence and now I would like to   
   think had he lived longer he could have done the same.    
      
   He is survived by his brother, sisters, nieces and nephews who still miss him   
   every day.    
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)