Dear Zachary,

I want to tell you a story. A story about what was, what is, and what will be. We never had a lot of time to talk. I’m sorry about that. I was always around, I just didn’t want to intrude. It’s hard you see, being family, but living so far away. Hope you can forgive me for that. Anyway, let’s start at the beginning…

Zachary, I am 14 years old and you have just been born. I feel too young to be an uncle. I don’t know if I am up for it. When I see you for the first time you are a 1 year old already and propping yourself up on two wobbly legs. You and your daddy have matching haircuts. He is proud. I pick you up and in the way that people who know nothing about children do, which is wearily. I walk you around the room to see what you are interested in. If you point at something, we dwell on it until you are bored then move onto the next thing. You are more interested in being dropped on the couch. Every time I drop you on the cushions, each time a little bit higher, the momentary fear fills your eyes with excitement. When you land safely you laugh wildly. One time I accidentally drop you on the hard arm of the couch, your head lands with a dull thud and your eyes start to fill with tears and mistrust and I panic. Your father comes into the room and asks what’s the matter. I tell him I have no idea, kids just cry I guess. You also threw up on me once so let’s just call it even.

Zachary, I am 20 and you are 6. You, your daddy and I are going snowmobiling. We ride on the shoulder of the road, going up and over driveways, veering around drainpipes. I get my snowmobile stuck in a ditch. I don’t get to use these in Michigan, you see. Your daddy gets off his and gets on mine, he bounces it up and down trying to get it out of the impossible spot I’ve gotten it into and starts to get very grumpy. You get off your kid-sized snowmobile and stand next to the road, looking back and wondering how anyone related to you could possibly not know how to ride a snowmobile. Your daddy notices you are only a few feet from the speeding traffic, not happily I can tell you. You don’t notice though, you just stand there as the cars rush past you. You are a fearless child. Your daddy yells at you to get away from the road and I feel like this is all my fault, that if you get hit by a car it will be because I don’t know how to ride a snowmobile and I feel the first parental shiver of panic ever to go through my body. I remember the moment perfectly. The color of your jacket, the sound of the road and your daddy’s frustration, my shame and fear. It is the first taste of being a parent I ever have and it scares the hell out of me for years to come.

Zachary, I am 26 and you are 12. Your aunt Sara is getting married and everyone is together. I am glad to be a part of it though I feel like a stranger here. You have too much hair and I guess that it will be that way for a long time to come. I hope that you enjoy that hair because you don’t know if it’ll last forever with these genes. Maybe you got lucky. I hope that you did. After the wedding you find some water balloons and do what 12 year old boys do. Your now-official-uncle Josh gives as good as he gets in the battle. I watch you chase each other, always laughing, always ready for the next round. I see family. I see love. It is nice to see it for even a little while. One time you come back to the front porch to find another water balloon, I call you “Roo” because that is what people in our family call you, I have heard it since you were a baby. You tell me that is a name for your Dad to call you, even though everyone here calls you that. What you mean is family, that is what your family calls you. I understand and return to Michigan. I hope things are different one day.

Zachary, I am 29 and you are 15. There isn’t a stitch of boy fat left in those cheeks. You’re on your way now. You have even more hair and your pants hang off your butt and it doesn’t bother me that much, but I tease you about it because I don’t know what else to say. I get you some drum equipment for Christmas, it is just what you wanted. I am glad your father was around to tell me what to buy. I am at the age when people my age start buying people your age the wrong thing for Christmas and birthdays unless given very specific instructions. I have had a difficult year. I am glad to spend a holiday with family, it means a lot to me. I see you once more after that, at my college graduation when I am 30. I am very glad that you made the trip with your dad. It meant a lot that you came.

Zachary, I am 33 and you are 19 and you have done something that hurts so many people more terribly that we could ever imagine is possible. I cannot understand it. I have been a 19 year old boy and I did not like it very much either. I have felt lost and alone, everyone does. I wish we could have talked more. I am deafened by the sound of the conversations we never had. I would have told you it is good to feel lost, it means there are endless possibilities. I would have told you finding yourself is part of the journey. And I would have told you to pull your pants up. But I can’t, because you are somewhere else.

Zachary, I am 42. I feel like I am old now, even though it isn’t necessarily true. Your sisters are teenagers. It is terrible. They are cute and blonde and the boys are showing up now. They appear on the porch steps, eyes full of innocence, bodies full of hormones. You should be here to chase them away, but you can’t, because you aren’t here. Your father does the best he can, but his heart isn’t in it. I take up the slack when I am in town. When the boys ask why they haven’t seen me before. I tell them I was recently paroled. They look doubtful, but cautious nonetheless. We get rid of most of the riff raff, but one or two stay, they always do. There will be late night phone calls and the occasional sounds of broken hearts from your sisters’ bedrooms. I tell them boys are stupid anyway, best to stay away, stick to books. They laugh and say, “oh Uncle Jimmy,” as if speaking to a child. It isn’t necessarily untrue.

At this point in my life, if I am lucky, then I have met a woman who loves me, and if I am smart, I have learned to let my guard down. I have seen the worried look of a daughter’s father and so I hope to have a son. I am partial to the name, Benjamin. It is a family name you see and I like old fashioned things. Your aunt may fight me on this, I may surrender. Did you know you shared a middle name with your father, grandfather, and great-grandfather and in this way it lasted for almost one hundred years? Wayne was a good name, a solid name, but if there is a son, his middle name will be Zachary.

Zachary, I am 65. I am an old man, but still better looking than your father. He is 75 and a bit slower these days. He has missed you for a very long time. We all have. Did I tell you I have a grandson? I will probably not understand his name. Kids these days. You would agree with me if you were here, you would be 51, but you aren’t, you are 19 and perfect. My grandson could be named Jupiter Carey or Starbucks Carey or some other nonsense, but his middle name will be Zachary if I have anything to say about it. It is a family name after all and we like old fashioned things.

I have thought of you for a very long time at this point, growing up by far more than leaps and bounds through my eyes. I think of water fights and snowmobiles because those are my memories. I am glad to have had any of them. I am grateful to have had all of them.

I hope to go where you are one day, to tell you more of the memories that haven’t happened yet, to pick up where things left off, to see all those I have missed for a very long time. I hope that we are all together then, in one form or another. Goodbye Zachary. Until next time.

Love,

Jimmy, your Uncle.