not a businessman, a business, man

He rode his bike to Sturgis.  South Dakota.  We followed him--my brother, Naughton and I--through Ohio and Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, hell you know your geography.  Past the Chicago skyline, past corn as far as you could see, past the plains the plains, the aptly named plains.  Past whole horizons of sunflowers high a man's head, each with the same cant toward the sun so it was hard to decide if they were many things or one leviathan thing.  Before we left we had to talk him out of the .38 on his person.  "In case there was trouble."  Nate said, "Is it loaded?" And he said, "Why the hell wouldn't it be?"  Actually, we all refused to make with trip unless he disarmed.  Extortion pure and simple, he's rarely talked into or out of much.

We met in 8th grade.  Naughton's mom give him lifts home from wrestling practice.  Home was way the hell over there pretty close to Duboistown.   Eleanor, his mother was in a wheel chair, but she was in charge.  She scolded him and scolded him.  JIMMY! Watch your mouth. JIMMY! Don't leave dishes in the sink.  JIMMY!  That's too loud.  And every time, Aunt Josephine, tittered behind her hand, which burnt the boy to the ground in anger. Yuhzha! he'd yell back, for that was the aunt's family sobriquet, GET IN YOUR ROOM.  Sometimes she'd do as commanded, usually not because it was too much fun to watch him burn.  We all loved to see him get fired up.  Still do.  Josephine was Eleanor's sister and well into adulthood had the working intellect of an 8 or 9 year old.  Sweet as pie, totally dependent on her family, and boy did she have the nephew's number.

Yeah, so.  The boy never was one, really.  Caring for his elders, running a household when most of us would've been stumped by a two-hole outhouse.

And lookout.  Did he run it. The kitchen spotless, the basement clean and fresh smelling.  The car was an early-mid 80's Chevy (Malibu if memory holds).  Interior got a bottle of ArmorAll every week, needed or not.  Vinyl surfaces so shiny and slick they made vinyl seem like a good option.  Antimacassars on all the seat positions.  Fix them please as you exit the vehicle.  From my house to school there was time for Arrowsmith's version of Come Together if you waited in the parking lot so as to enter the building just as the 1st bell was ringing, which we did, oh, every damn day, refusing to give them an extra second of our precious time.

So smart-alecky smart if a chemistry lab was being graded by result, he'd start at the bottom with A-grade result and work the bitch backward calculating values/amounts/ratios/Avegadro's number as he went, conceiving a perfectly fictitious experiment.  And get an A for himself and anyone who copied that lab.  He couldn't do it alone.  The way I helped was by turning the pages of the most current Playboy and keeping the radio tuned.  Where were you on Sunday nights Sept '87-May '88?

I made him mad ONE time.  I thought the crotchless biker panties he found at Sturgis were some kind of gag--poor choice of words--joke.  They were not, hence the anger.  They were actually for someone.  Ahem.  Well, they ended up funny, eventually, just like i first imagined.  I can't say i'm sorry, because i know he values the truth.

You can call him late, say, "come quickly."  And most of the times he'll do it sober.

He talks to my kids like they're human beings, not cartoons.  And when we were kids we made him talk to the parents, straight laced, responsible kid, first in the class, he was perfect cover.  So after his and Wyatt's last pow-wow.  The school teacher called me with a heads up:  Wy-man seemed to have learned a good amount about certain Steeler quarterbacks and sex crimes, real and imagined.  Sorta outta left field for the Potter kid, not typically his issue (though he has plenty)....  yeah, teach, I hear you.  See the thing is, well, we have this friend he's visiting a lot b/c he's leaving the country.  Heart of gold.  24kt. (like his Rolex President)  Very dear to us.  But, well, he's ....I need a good word for...he's feral.  He just is.  And like that lilac bush you don't dare touch because lilacs oughta BE wild, I'm not changing him.  But I will talk to the boy and make sure he is debriefed and no more Uncle Jimmy stories make it back to school.

Threw up in the water fountain at our wedding hotel.  Grabbed only one pregnant woman's ass.  Every superbowl he pays me one handle of Jim Beam as restitution.  This will continue until one of us dies.  Goes to an eye doctor three states away.  Has two vintage cars.  Buys boots that squeak.  Hoards cash.  Thinks BudLight is made by trappist monks.  About as religious as a turnip, yet, actually made us wait in the car while he went to confession (i can only figure they allow installments).  Apparently some kind of asphalt expert.  NORAD went to DEFCON 4 when he landed in Saudi Arabia.  On the phone to the poor woman who merely worked the phones at the trailer joint, he said before he hung up, "ok, Shirley, well get your deal-making pants on, I'll be there shortly."   Wears belt buckles the size of pie plates.  Has a man crush on Ricky Rudd.  Using his kitchen to archive about the last decade of the Washington Post, Sunday paper edition.  Makes background checks.  Drives bank tellers nuts.  Has been found wandering the streets around Pimlico after the Preakness, TWO YEARS IN A ROW.  Only one of those years involved passing out, getting badly sunburned, and relieved of personal possessions.  Will talk your ear off.  Has hair-brained politics.  Maybe the worst diet imaginable.  Poor exercise habits.  And is, I've said, quite, quite dear to me.