He came into our lives one September nippy morning. I was four and he had just arrived. We called him Gene. Two years ago he left us after a long battle with cancer. And today I remember so much. Things nobody knew but us. We slept in the same bed room on twin beds for years. He never went to college but he was the smartest in our family. He worked in the Mill and worked at Fort Benning and then the Post office and finally when he retired, well--that's not exactly the right word--but he began to help people with their tax returns. Well over 500. And one day I asked him why he charged so little--he had a gold mine there. He said a lot of people had little money and he wanted to provide a service for those that came. And come they did. Many from all over the country. We all know that word of mouth is the best publicity and people just talking how good he was at his work. And so they knocked on his door or called him long distance.
The last year of his life was hard, very hard. The cancer had ravaged his body. And so I said, Well I guess you will hang up the tax business now since you don't feel well. He sighed and said I'm gonna keep working and he did. He prepared close to 500 tax forms that very hard year. And when tax season was over he put aside the tax papers and put down his yellow pencil that was stamped: Gene Lovett.
He loved his wife Charlotte fiercely. And he had four children he was very proud of. He had a hard edge some time. He was red-headed and had a temper. Like the rest of us he was a flawed human being--as we all are. He built his own house and he had never done anything like that before. And he raised his kids there and his wife stays there to this very day. He helped others with their houses and painted I don't know how many houses with no help from anyone.
Like most siblings our relationship was up and down. We could make each other mad and we knew how to press the right button. Several years before he died I began to send him puzzles. Not easy ones. Some more than a thousand pieces. And he framed many of these. His last Christmas he told me he had a gift for me but it was too big to send by mail and he wanted it to get there undamaged. He finally got it delivered through one of his kids. I unwrapped the gift and I was stunned. He had taken one of the hard puzzles I had sent, pieced it together and had it framed. He did this for me. So as I walk into my house and open the door and on the right wall the puzzle hangs and I see it everyday.
At his graveside I had a part and as I stood to speak the wind took my notes and blew them away. Some even landed at the bottom of the gravesite. And people started laughing and laughing and somebody said out loud: "Well Gene had the last word."
Two years ago he left us and I look at his picture on my desk almost every day and I remember.
(Yesterday was my brother's birthday.)
--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com
Love this, Roger.
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