copyright Leader Publications 2008
“I figure my nieces and nephews can put me in a nursing home when I get old just as easily as my own kids could,” my brother Chris once said in explaining why he didn’t feel it necessary to have kids of his own.
And, “When I put something down, I want it to be there later when I go back to get it,” I heard him telling our cousin, the father of four girls including triplets, in explaining the same thing.
Chris was the oldest of four and never wanted kids. In his teen years, he always said he was going to be a rich playboy until he reached 25.
Twenty-five turned into thirty and he almost made 35 before he finally did get married.
I was pretty surprised he even got engaged, but really didn’t think the engagement would ever lead to an actual wedding.
Chris’ wife Karen also felt no real need to have children – that is – until she began to listen to her biological clock.
That was how Chris explained their decision to have kids to my mom. He also admitted, though, that my own kids were what changed his mind.
We had two boys and three girls. The girls in particular were just crazy about their Uncle Chris. Once, after he and I got off the phone, I had to call him right back because the girls were crying since they didn’t get to speak to him. I told him later how, after they spoke with him, they each bragged to the other, “He called me honey” and, “He called me sweetie.” You would have thought he was some kind of celebrity.
I remember one time when Chris, my kids and I were leaving our mom’s apartment. As I walked down the concrete porch, I saw Chris walking ahead surrounded by the kids, bent over like an old man. He had to do that in order for each of them be able to reach at least a finger to hold on to. He had two kids holding on to one hand and three on the other.
Chris’ popularity was really brought out, though, at our dad’s second wedding.
We arrived for the wedding and saw my step-mom-to-be, Dee, standing radiantly in a side doorway of the little church. As we approached her, Chris happened to come around a corner of the church.
“Uncle Chris! Uncle Chris!” the girls squealed as they broke away from me and ran to Chris, passing by and completely ignoring Dee as they went.
The kids’ adoration for him eventually melted his heart, so Chris and Karen finally decided that, after Karen worked for another year so they could save her income, they would try to get pregnant.
But something happened and Karen found herself pregnant right away. Just before they were preparing to go out, Karen used a home pregnancy test kit and discovered she was, indeed, pregnant. She told Chris just as they were heading out the door.
They were already late and had no time to stay home and discuss the surprise, so they left, stopping on the way to fill up the car.
Chris was so distracted with the news (How in the world was he going to put the child through college, he worried. No matter that he was an accountant and was pretty good with his money as it was.), that he drove off after filling up the car without remembering to remove the fuel hose.
The hose ripped off the gas pump at the top where it attached, causing gasoline to spew out all over the place.
The cashier inside didn’t know how to shut off the pump and had to call in the fire department. Two fire trucks responded along with the police and the station had to be closed for a couple hours until the mess was cleaned up. At least Chris was insured.
About nine months later, Chris returned to the station and showed the cashier a picture of the cause of all the commotion that day, little Amy Christine.
Chris and Karen lived in Ohio when Amy was born, but moved back to the St. Louis area soon after to be closer to family. I remember one time when he, Karen and the baby were over and Karen was changing the baby’s diaper on the couch. Chris was standing over Karen’s shoulder, holding out a wet wipe for her with one hand as he held the container in the other.
Karen told me that while in the hospital for Amy’s birth, when a nurse was explaining how to care for the umbilical cord, Chris took notes.
Chris was 37 when Amy was born. He was 39 when little Katie came along, with Karen just a few years younger.
When Katie was about six weeks old, the family stopped in at a grocery store. Karen realized she left her checkbook in the car. She handed the baby to Chris, who was already holding two-year old Amy by the hand. As soon as Karen left, Amy broke free from Chris and took off running through the store. Being a male and not knowing how to multi-task, a woman would have simply clutched the baby tightly to her chest, Chris quickly turned to the clerk at the nearby video counter, handed baby Katie over to her, then turned to chase after Amy.
Chris was blessed with two little girls that were as crazy about him as my own girls were. So much so that Chris and Karen developed a little family joke and decided Chris should be called Elvis, because the girls would scream in excitement whenever he arrived at home.
They have a magnetic Elvis doll on their refrigerator, though these days, Karen says they now call Chris “the King.” She does so in a sarcastic voice, for some reason, as if to insinuate that even though Chris may think he’s the king of the house, the reality is a bit otherwise.
Chris now lives in a home where things are not always found where he left them. There is dog hair on the furniture from the dog that is not allowed on the furniture but who quietly sneaks off the sofa in the mornings when she hears footsteps coming. Karen says the dog gives herself away because she always forgets to put the couch pillows back.
There are hermit crabs in the upstairs bathroom and the finished basement with wet bar and built-in bookshelves is full of nothing but toys, the bookshelves making for a nice townhouse for Barbie.
Even so, Chris seems happier than he’s ever been. And something tells me that his own kids won’t be quite so quick to put “Elvis, the King” into a nursing home when he gets old.
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