Remembering

Sad news from Canada today, my Uncle Jackie died on Hogmanay evening. He'd been seriously ill most of last year, so in a way it's a blessing because he'll suffer no more.

My uncle was a funny man, not one for affection and terrible at keeping in touch, I disagreed with a lot of his values and didn't really take to him the times that I met him, but he was my Mum's little brother and she thought a lot of him, so we always stayed in touch especially after my mum's death.

I have very few memories of him, but one memory is of the time we went to the chip shop and he managed to polish off a fish supper, a pie supper, a single white pudding and still find space to finish off my Dad's chips. I had never seen anything like it in my life but I took a strange pride in having a real life Mr Creosote
for an uncle!
He had a happy full life in Vancouver with his wife Karin and my two cousins, he made many friends over the 40 years he lived there, but never ever forgot his Edinburgh roots.

My picture today is the (now naked) Eskimo doll that he brought my sister when he came back to visit us in 1976. I inherited him many years ago and I think I'm responsible for his lack of clothes, but I've always liked him despite everyone thinking he's ugly. I think he makes a cheering picture to remember my Uncle Jackie by.