An Uncle Tom memory

My Uncle Tom died this week. My father’s younger brother, he was the sixth of seven siblings and the last of them to survive. Following a lingering illness, his death came as a relief, and as an occasion for reminiscence.

Perhaps because he never married, or perhaps because he lived for years in his parents’ home caring for his aging mother, it seemed to me that Uncle Tom held more strongly than his siblings qualities that I perceived as quintessentially “McCormick.” Among these were generosity; a sense of purpose and duty, including to family; and an ethical core unwavering in its sense of right and wrong. Uncle Tom was kind, friendly, and a font of engaging stories; he remembered every birthday; he took nieces and nephews on extravagant trips (including my brother and me to the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal). We always enjoyed his visits. But, like all McCormicks, his judgments could be sharp. And he harbored a steeliness that could edge into severity, which at times cowed me.

One Uncle Tom memory holds a distinguished place in my trove of family lore. Its taproot, as with any Uncle Tom story, is kindness and generosity: he flew across the country, along with my parents and my mother’s stepsister, Sheila Dowd, to celebrate my college graduation, in the Hudson Valley of New York, in 1988.

After the ceremony, that quartet of adults took a friend and me on a week-long trip through upstate New York and New England. We rented a van. My father and Uncle Tom handled the driving and sat in front; my mother and Aunt Sheila consulted maps and sat in the middle seats; and my friend and I sat in the back: a congenial group.

One day featured a long drive through New Hampshire and a good distance into Maine. As was typical, Mom and Aunt Sheila maintained a lively conversation, sparked by observations from guidebooks that littered the middle seats. We stopped for an early lunch, then began a long trek up I-95 to our next hotel, with Uncle Tom at the wheel. At some point, the two women agreed, we should break up the afternoon by stopping at a local tourist destination. They busied themselves researching possibilities. I can’t recall what they selected: a maritime museum, a gallery, a Victorian mansion. But it was right off the interstate, and we could stretch our legs for 20 minutes. It was coming up, in just three or four exits. Uncle Tom drove on, silent. Aunt Sheila read aloud one guidebook’s description; Mom read another’s. Now it was just one exit away. We barreled along. The exit approached. “Here it is!” Aunt Sheila said. Uncle Tom kept his foot on the accelerator. Mom leaned forward. “It’s this exit, Tom,” she said. Uncle Tom said nothing, aimed the van straight ahead, and sped past. “We need to -- ah, well,” Aunt Sheila said, craning to glimpse the road not taken, then slumping in her seat. My friend and I looked at each other, eyes wide. My mother and Aunt Sheila formed a formidable pair; I couldn’t recall anyone ignoring them in quite this way. And Uncle Tom was usually so solicitous. No one spoke. Then, perhaps five miles up the road, Uncle Tom announced, “We’re going to get to the hotel, and we’re going to have a drink!” Which, an hour or so later, is precisely what we did. We checked into the hotel; Uncle Tom or Dad pulled a bottle of Irish from a suitcase; I filled the ice bucket; somebody brought out the mixed nuts; and we all sat in the hotel suite and had a drink. Sitting in a padded chair, holding his sweating plastic cup, Uncle Tom let out a long exhale and said, “Aaah, baby!” with what seemed particular satisfaction.

I took a solo trip in Scotland last summer, walking for a week across the southern lowlands, sleeping each night in a different town. In the mornings I stopped often, taking pictures, admiring scenery. But after lunch as the sun lowered and I grew weary and my destination beckoned I would up my pace and pause less, pulled by visions of the Scotch I would soon sip at the local pub. Uncle Tom, I realized, knew of what he spoke: We’re going to get to the hotel, and we’re going to have a drink. Each evening I drank a silent toast in his honor.