#MicroblogMondays: My tormentor, my friend, my cousin

The phone rang earlier this afternoon, my parents' number. It was my dad, and I knew right away something was wrong. 

For one awful moment, I thought he was calling about my mom. (It wasn't that.)

But he had to repeat himself two or three times before I realized who he was calling about.  

My cousin. 65 years old. 11 months older than me. Died in his sleep overnight. 

(The freaky thing is, his dad ALSO died in bed, at 65, right at this time of year. Mid-October, 26 years ago.) 

He was a big guy (retired cop), had some health issues over the years, probably drank a little too much. Very opinionated -- revelled in being a sh*t disturber.  ;)  Lots of nervous energy.  

But he was full of life and laughs and jokes and stories. He knew EVERYONE. He'd send me photos of random people, out of the blue, and I'd think "Am I supposed to know this person?"  And then I'd realize I DID know this person. He was golf buddies with at least two guys I knew from high school. I used to joke that he should go to one of my high school reunions because he'd know as many people there as I did. 

We were born in the same small town, near where our grandparents farmed, and lived there for the first few years of our lives, and spent a lot of time together then. Later, both our families moved further afield, but we often stayed with his family when they lived in the city, and we saw each other at our grandparents' farm, summers and holidays. He was kind of like the big brother I never had. 

As we got older, he (and his brothers) used to tease the life out of me. I was a sensitive kid, and he made me miserable at times. And yet? As an adult, which cousin did I think of most often, want to see whenever we were "back home"? (Go figure...) 

Sadly, that didn't happen as often as either of us would have liked, especially after I got married and moved 1000 miles away to a different province, and he got busy with his own family (three kids, now adults -- the youngest is a few months older than Katie would have been). The last time I saw him was 7 years ago in the fall of 2018, when I was "home" for Thanksgiving, and he brought his mom (my aunt) and another aunt out to my parents' place from the city for a visit, one afternoon. (We took a photo then -- the last one I have of us together. I'm glad I have it.)

But we "friended" each other on social media (I tried to ignore the crass joke memes and political things he'd post -- and some of them WERE funny), and he'd occasionally message me privately with an old family photo, or a note about how his mom/my aunt was doing. Once in a while, he'd call me (often when he'd had a drink or two, I suspect). He always made me laugh. The last time we chatted, he told me he wanted to see me next time I was home, and he really wanted me to meet his oldest daughter, because she reminded him so much of me (!).  

And he'd always end off by saying, "Love you, cousin." And I'd tell him "Love you too."  

And I did.  

I will miss those calls. I will miss him. 

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.