Happy 90th Birthday, Uncle Bud

(Thanks to my cousin, Lisa, for this photo.)

I'd love to have been able to be in Juneau, last weekend, to help my Uncle Bud celebrate his 90th birthday! Look at him! He's still such a handsome fellow!

Uncle Bud is my mom's younger brother. My mom had lots of stories about his growing-up years, when he was sometimes known as "Squirt," because he was small for his age. According to Mom, he was somewhat of a "Dennis the Menace!" She told me about how he would catch flies and trap them inside the snapdragons in front of their house, so the flowers buzzed and jiggled whenever someone walked up to the door; how he poked the eyes out of her dolly (which I now have, stored in a cedar chest, and which is still "eyeless"), and how he, she and their dog, Muggs, played sun-up to sun-down on the beach, when they lived in Seaside, Oregon.

Circa 1936. My mom, Margaret, and her brother, Bud.

1938, Glenwood, Oregon. Bud and Margaret in their yard.

One of my earliest memories of Uncle Bud was when we lived in Ketchikan, Alaska. I was four years old, and Uncle Bud, who, I believe, was in the service at that time, was coming to visit us. Mom told me I could wait outside, on the sidewalk for him to show up. "How will I know him?" I asked my mom. "He'll be whistling," she answered. So right! Within a few minutes, up walked my handsome uncle, whistling a beautiful bird melody. 

Another early memory is of Uncle Bud coming to see us a couple years later, when we lived in Portland, Oregon. I'm not sure, but I think he may have been going to school, at that time, in Klamath Falls, where he trained to be a diesel mechanic. He pulled up to our house in a brand new car, which was a ghastly chartreuse green. When my mom teased him about it, and he asked, "Well ... what color is it?" Uncle Bud is color blind.

Uncle Bud was a genius at building and flying radio controlled model airplanes. He took me with him sometimes, and once I got to go with him to retrieve one of his planes that had flown beyond the range of his radio signal and crash landed in a tall tree, on someone's property.

Mostly I remember Uncle Bud as a kind, loving uncle, who doted on me as a child, always making feel special. For his 90th birthday I baked him some of our family's traditional "French Cookies," and sent them to him in Alaska. Many happy returns, Uncle Bud!

Circa 1944. Bud and Margaret

Grandma Rose and Grandpa Ivan (Bud's parents) with Bud as a young man.