I can’t bear in mind the primary time I met Jon, however that’s as a result of I used to be solely 2 years previous when my Aunt Carla introduced him house from the hospital.
What I can bear in mind is that, from a really early age, he at all times felt extra like a brother than a cousin to me.
Jon and I at all times gave the impression to be there for one another throughout our highest highs and our lowest lows, our lives woven collectively just like the patchwork quilts of our Appalachian Scots-Irish ancestors.
I used to be the eldest son of the eldest son, and Jon was the primary born son of my father’s sister, who was two years youthful than him, simply as Jon was two years youthful than me.
We each got here into this world beneath less-than-ideal circumstances. My father was shipped off to Southeast Asia to assist the Vietnam Conflict efforts only a few hours after I used to be born, whereas Jon by no means knew his delivery father.
We each wound up dwelling with our beloved grandparents for some time, creating extremely robust bonds with them (and between us) that may in the end final a lifetime and have a profound affect on the lads we grew to become.
Jon and I have been each sweet-natured, delicate, considerably shy, and foolish as younger boys, maybe because of the female vitality of spending our infancy surrounded by our moms, aunts, and Granny.
We have been additionally each drawn to Grandad, a bearish mountain of a person with a powerful work ethic, a profitable profession, an awesome knack for storytelling, an infectious giggle, and an affinity for shenanigans we each adored.
Even after our respective mother and father had moved out, my dad’s 3 siblings and their children would all get collectively at my grandparents’ home for each main vacation– birthdays, Mom’s Day, Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
Neither Jon or I had siblings for the primary 8-10 years of our lives, so we have been actually like two peas in a pod.
We each wore hand-me-down garments, usually stained with the remnants of our limitless out of doors adventures, with matching “bowl minimize” hairdos given by my grandmother.
As my cousins and I look again on our childhood pictures now– lots of which you’ll see within the slideshow– you understand Granny was CLEARLY incapable of chopping a straight line!
Each time our prolonged household acquired collectively, Jon and I’d undergo the pleasantries all younger children endure at household gatherings– the pinching of cheeks, the ruffling of hair, the “my the way you’ve grown” commentary.
However inevitably we might lock eyes, transfer away from the grownups, and say, “Wanna play?” And as soon as we have been launched from our household obligations, we have been like Wild Issues let out!
Jon and I had a basic boyhood friendship, like Huck Finn & Tom Sawyer or Calvin & Hobbes. I can nonetheless image him as a boy in my thoughts, his eyes broad, his toothy grin, and his blond hair bouncing within the breeze as we ran off looking for our subsequent journey.
We have been each drawn to nature, particularly after Granny & Grandad purchased a trailer on Lake Hartwell for our households to share once I was 5 or 6 years previous. This was our childhood comfortable place!
With no telephones or video video games to distract us, we spent lengthy summer season days stuffed with swimming, selecting recent blackberries, fishing off the dock, leaping into inside tubes and spinning till we have been dizzy, cracking one another as much as the purpose of hysterical laughter, and laying subsequent to the open home windows at evening so the cicadas and tree frogs might serenade us to sleep.
In a dialog a couple of years earlier than Jon died, we talked about these early childhood reminiscences with misty-eyed nostalgia, and Jon instructed me that these have been among the finest days of his life. These blissful reminiscences would play an enormous position within the males we in the end grew to become.
One of many first occasions I bear in mind pondering of Jon as my brother was after he and Carla moved simply across the nook from my mother and father and I within the mid-Seventies.
We attended the identical elementary college for some time, and I’d stroll him house daily, since he was two years youthful than me and wanted to cross a serious street to achieve his home.
We took a shortcut by means of the yard of a home subsequent to the schoolyard, the place a few teen hooligans ambushed us with pocket knives and demanded our cash.
Jon couldn’t have been greater than 6 or 7 on the time and, as his eyes welled up with tears and fears, I instantly acquired indignant and screamed at them to depart us alone. Over time, that protecting intuition solely grew stronger, as I noticed that Jon regarded as much as me like an older brother.
Although we performed collectively competitively tons of of occasions over time, capturing hoops, enjoying soccer, swinging throughout creeks, taking goal apply at aluminum cans and plates with our BB weapons, and wrestling as younger energetic boys usually do, I can not recall us ever having a serious disagreement.
We at all times supported and inspired one another, and our fraternal bond solely grew stronger over time.
After my grandparents and Jon’s household moved out to the Winder/Auburn space within the early ’80s, dwelling a half-mile away from one another, my summer season trip time with Jon, Carla, and my grandparents grew to become a much-needed escape from the troubles I used to be coping with at house.
Jon’s candy, smiling nature appeared to me like a reflection of his mother’s nurturing love. Once I visited them, Carla usually handled me extra like a son than a nephew, and her deep love for Jon was each evident and galvanizing.
I’ve fond reminiscences of days once I fell and harm myself whereas driving Jon’s minibike, and Carla tended to my wounds. Or she would supply to scrub our hair within the kitchen sink on the finish of an extended, sweaty summer season day. Perhaps this explains why Jon in the end grew as much as be such a faithful father to his daughter, Blair.
By the point we have been youngsters, Jon and I had our respective struggles with dominant authority figures, with ladies, with bullies, with feeling like odd geese in our respective social circles.
We nonetheless beloved enjoying outside each probability we acquired, however our conversations grew to become deeper and extra significant. We talked on the cellphone usually, serving to one another by means of clashes with mother and father (or, in his case, his stepdad), crushes, heartbreaks, and all the same old coming-of-age challenges.
Even in occasions when it felt like we have been on their lonesome in our respective worlds, we at all times had one another. Jon was my finest good friend and confidant. He was so considerate, thoughtful, empathetic and, in some ways, sensible past his years. At the same time as a child, he at all times appeared to have an “previous soul,” with Grandad as his #1 male position mannequin.
In early maturity, I used to be capable of be there for Jon when the connection between him and his stepfather grew to become too troublesome to bear.
He lived with me throughout a formative time in each our lives, and we grew to become a lot nearer, being on the core of an ever-growing group of oddballs and outcasts who have been looking for our place and our function on the earth.
Once I wound up homeless at age 19 after a sequence of non-public struggles, Jon was the one member of my household who knew the place I used to be, and he instructed his mother about my dire scenario.
By means of Jon, Carla reached out and supplied me cash to get a room at a boarding home, which gave me a base from which I might get again on my toes and in the end rebuild my whole life. Simply over a yr later, I used to be working my method by means of faculty.
In spite of everything this shared historical past, it ought to come as no shock that Jon was the very best man at my wedding ceremony in 1991.
He was additionally the primary one that knew in regards to the ever-increasing issues in that marriage. He was one of many first folks to carry my daughter Allie within the hospital after her delivery in 2001. And he was the primary individual I instructed once I determined to file for divorce a couple of years later.
Now in our mid 30s, we poured our hearts out about our respective life struggles in a method that we hadn’t executed in years, and it was then that Jon instructed me for the primary time a couple of lady he’d taken an curiosity in, Elizabeth.
Regardless of being one of many coolest, handsomest, funniest, and kindest males I knew, Jon had solely had a couple of important relationships at that time in his life. So when he talked about Elizabeth in a method that made it clear that he needed to be a greater man for her, I knew it was actually severe.
On our method again house from the mountains, we stopped off at our household’s previous property on Lake Hartwell. Our little cove had lengthy since dried up, and the trailer Grandad had purchased 30 years earlier had fallen into disrepair. By this level Grandad had been gone for 7 years, and his loss was a giant blow to each of us.
Jon and I hugged, and I had tears in my eyes as all the nice and cozy childhood reminiscences washed over me. At that second, feeling scared and overwhelmed by all of the adjustments in my life, I genuinely treasured his companionship, his sage recommendation, and the energy of our brotherly bond greater than I ever had earlier than.
It pains me a little bit to confess that Jon and I didn’t keep up a correspondence as a lot as I’d’ve preferred within the years after he requested me to be a groomsman in his 2009 wedding ceremony to Elizabeth.
Our careers took us in numerous instructions, however each have been impressed by our grandparents.
Like Grandad, Jon beloved working together with his arms, and began his personal profitable house transforming enterprise. Impressed by Granny and Grandad’s love of journey, Mary and I launched Inexperienced World Journey and Blue Ridge Mountains Journey Information, visiting 50+ international locations world wide.
Fortunately Carla and Lawayne took up our longstanding household custom of internet hosting vacation gatherings at their home after Granny died in 2009. And each time the Loves acquired collectively and Jon walked within the room, I nonetheless felt that very same previous pleasure of attending to spend time with my brother from one other mom.
We’d usually speak about our parallel lives as devoted husbands and fathers, about our respective companies, and about our reminiscences of the great previous days, with frequent bursts of laughter and tomfoolery that jogged my memory of the children we was once.
Our childhood days at Lake Hartwell continued to play a central position in our middle-aged lives.
Mary and I maintain a ship docked at Lake Allatoona, spending 3-4 days every week there when the climate is heat. And Jon and Elizabeth’s household would all collect at their personal lake close to Dahlonega virtually each weekend, creating magical reminiscences I do know Blair and her cousins will treasure without end.
After a life stuffed with many challenges, it was so gratifying for me to see Jon discover his good match in Elizabeth. I had by no means seen him happier than he was together with her, till Blair got here alongside and made his life full. As a doting dad myself, seeing how his smile lit up each time Blair was round crammed my coronary heart with pleasure.
As we watched Jon tackle his 3-year battle with most cancers with energy, dignity, and an unbelievable measure of intestinal fortitude that jogged my memory of Grandad, it was troublesome for me, figuring out that this was one journey I couldn’t be a part of him on, regardless of how badly I wanted I may very well be his protecting Large Brother once more.
And although this insidious illness could have crushed him in the long run, I can’t assist however be grateful figuring out that Jon’s spirit is lastly capable of run free once more.
Free from ache. Free from struggling. Free from fear.
I wish to think about him with his eyes broad, his toothy grin, and his blond hair bouncing within the breeze, speeding in direction of Granny and Grandad, and the largest, most lovely lake you ever noticed… –by Bret Love
