Good-bye Doc, they don't make them like you anymore

You know what really sucks about getting old? It's not that you can't do the things you used to and it's not all those aches and pains you wake up with. it isn't that your forget where you put things or that the only time any one asks for an ID is when you go to pick up your pills at the pharmacy. Not, it's none of that, it's that each year you lose more of the people you love.

If you've read this blog you know both my parents are gone, and a few months ago I lost an uncle. Last night I lost another, my father's brother. I think I wrote about him when I first started this blog during the old AOL days, I had become close to him when I first moved here to the little house on the lake, they have a summer place next door.

He became a surrogate father of sorts, I would go over there and we would talk about all kinds of things. The last two years we began to lose him, je had dementia and some physical problems, and his mind was gone, or at least his ability to communicate effectively. I always felt he knew what we were saying to him and that he knew what he wanted to say back, he just couldn't.

My Uncle was a pediatrician, he was the first in town, in fact in the whole area. Even after he retired, and was in his late seventies, I could go to him and ask him about my sick grand-kids and he would tell me what to tell my kids on how to fix them. He was an old-fashioned doctor, who actually took the time to talk to the kids and the parents. He even made house calls. When my oldest sister was about seven (I think it was seven but then I was only 1) he saved her life. Her spleen ruptured and in those days there just wasn't the technology like there is now, but he was able to diagnose it and get her operated on. In fact she told me today how even almost fifty years later he would call her when he heard of something new that she would have to watch out for so she wouldn't get sick.

I've written on here before how my family, especially on my father's side, were all very close. Now they are one closer to all being together again. I'm going to miss the "Bad Doc", as will so many others whose lives he touched.