the fossil record
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Missing Persons
He was my maternal grandfather, and he owned a barbershop in downtown Brooklyn, but he never gave me a haircut. He was one of those people connected to me, but missing from my life. I often speculated about some of those persons.
I never met either one of my grandfathers. My grandfather, the barber, was separated from my grandmother, and he lived with a woman with whom he had children, but whom he never married. Ironically, I did meet her. One of my cousins once remarked that he had beautiful green eyes. The only time I saw him was at his wake, and his eyes were closed. I don't ever remember wanting to see him; he was never there to be missed. His two daughters, my mother and my Aunt Grace, never mentioned him, nor did my grandmother speak of him.
My paternal grandfather lived far away from me in Salt Lake City, Utah. I never saw him, dead or alive, and by the time I finally made it out west, he had been deceased for many years. All I know about him is that he was over six feet tall, and was a sometimes strict Mormon with a drinking problem. He was the reason my father left home.
I never met my paternal grandmother, but I did correspond with her. My father always commented on her beaming blue eyes and jet-black hair. The entire family treasured her; I am sorry I never met her.
My father was also one of those missing persons, but he made an appearance when I was thirty-five years old. I was always curious about him, and he was the reason I started writing to my grandmother.
One evening I received a phone call, and it was my father's voice that I was hearing for the first time in my life. I nervously made arrangements to meet him at Grand Central Station in Manhattan. I always dreamed that when I met him he would be a successful affluent person. When I finally encountered him at that historic city landmark, I found him to be the opposite of what I expected. He looked haggard, and his clothes were ragged. I soon discovered that he had just gotten off the city's skid row on the Bowery; I had to loan him money. Eventually I did form a good relationship with him, but I was tremendously disappointed at that time.
When he returned to his birthplace, Salt Lake City, I visited him, and I was able to meet other missing persons. He introduced me to his sister, my Aunt June, and his two brothers, my Uncle Eldon and Uncle Wayne. I developed good relationships with them, and I often visit them in Utah. I had shortened the list of missing persons in my life.
Uncle Andy was an interesting person on my mother's side of the family that I never knew. He was my grandmother's younger brother, and he died at the age of twenty-five when I was about two years old.
The unusual thing about Uncle Andy was that he was always there with me. He was in an ornate black box tied with a thick white piece of rope. I could see it from my bed where it rested on an open shelf atop a closet directly across the room. While working as a Merchant Marine, he contracted an unusual blood infection from an insect bite. Because the family could not afford to have his body shipped home to Brooklyn from California, the only alternative was cremation. Uncle Andy's ashes reposed in that special chest.
From what I have ascertained, Uncle Andy was a headstrong, reckless and tempestuous young man. He rode motorcycles, and wore a bandana around his head; his body was covered with outlandish tattoos, and many times he brought wild animals home from overseas. His life was short, but the time he did have was spent in a wild and tumultuous manner. When Uncle Andy's brother, Tony, died the family decided to place his ashes in Uncle Tony's coffin. Sometimes while lying down, I think of that black box that once rested in my bedroom.
Clyde Borg