Ordinary Joe

January 3, 2022

I’ve lost several hours today looking at old pictures. I can’t find the one I was looking for, but now I’m not sure it ever existed - I just remember it so vividly because I was there. 

My Uncle Steve died on Dec 28. I’m still, we’re still, wrapping our heads around that. 

Steve, more commonly known as “Joe”, is my dad’s younger brother, his only sibling. They lived at opposite ends of the same road for more than 40 years. Their phone numbers - just digits apart. If you close your eyes and one of them talks – you’d be hard pressed to know if it was Steve or Dave. 

He was my “favorite” - you know if you had a favorite. 

He was there when I needed several trucks to move all my crap to storage when I was getting divorced.

When he caught wind that Storm had died and we needed to bury him in the backyard he told my dad “I have a Dr’s appointment, but as soon as I’m done there I’ll be up with my machine.” And he was. 

You were likely to find him putzing around in dirty jeans, work boots and ALWAYS wearing a hat. In the early days, he’d be smoking a cigar until he quit and the cigars were replaced with a toothpick. It wasn’t uncommon to find him working on a project at the firehouse, the fairgrounds, or here or there. If he couldn’t do it or fix it himself - he knew who could. 

When we were building our new house, he gave me very specific instructions on where a load of gravel was to be dumped when it was delivered. He even marked the spot with a big stake painted with an orange top. I did NOT understand the assignment and had them dump it behind the stake – you know where this is going, right? It was supposed to be in front of the stake - in the driveway. “Heather Bee, now it's in the grass.... I’m going to lose 10% in the lawn.” He said it with a smile, shaking his head. You can better believe I didn’t screw that up the next time it got delivered and ate up the corner of my driveway. I still have the scratches in the pathfinder bumper to prove it!

So back to that picture I was looking for - it was of him, sitting at an old green picnic table, under the apple tree, studying the plans for my new house. It was the day he was going to start digging the foundation. I expected him to pull in, fire up the engine on a machine and start digging a hole. Apparently, it is a little more precise than that. He sat at that table for about an hour, before I couldn’t take it anymore. 

“Uncle Steve, is everything ok?”

“Yup, I’m just checking my math” 

Up until then, I hadn’t really given much thought to how smart he was, watching him work on my dream house day after day - with Dad, Stephen, David and even Paul I began to appreciate his knowledge, his skills, and how he made it look so easy.

The hours we all spent together day after day after day – shedding some blood, a few tears and so much sweat - are some of my most precious memories almost 10 years later. 

He loved his country music. The other day I was listening to the radio as I was cleaning the kitchen and Jordan Davis’ current song came on. As I sang along, I immediately thought of him. The lyrics go like this…

Find the one you can't live without

Do what you love but call it work

Send your prayers up and your roots down deep

'Cause the truth about it is

It all goes by real quick

You can't buy happiness

But you can buy dirt

And he could haul it, dump it or spread it for you … all you had to do was ask because he was no ordinary Joe.