In Memory of Uncle Eddie
My great uncle, Edwin Lane Dunbaugh, passed away last summer on August 20th. He had gotten ill, and we all knew the day was coming, but that doesn’t prepare you for what is to come. We had his memorial service this past weekend at Beavertail Lighthouse in Rhode Island. It was a beautiful service and it would have been exactly what he would have wanted it to be! It was a warm day with a wonderful cool breeze coming in. A large crowd of family, friends and colleagues stood outside in front of the lighthouse and shared stories and memories of my uncle. The fog horn was blowing in the background and there were little monarch butterflies flying all around us. I had heard some of those stories several times from my uncle, but none of those memories were MY memories of him… or memories I would have shared. I wanted to share, but I was unable to speak. I stood back and watched other people share and I watched through the lens of my camera.
As a little girl, we called him Uncle Eddie. When I was in my early teens, he told me to call him Ed, as most adults called him that. Ed and I used to sit at the table together and drink large glasses of Chocolate milk. He loved chocolate, mayonnaise and salt. He sent us a huge Hersey Chocolate Bar one year for Christmas. We kept it in the freezer and I remember my dad had to use a chisel and hammer to break pieces off. He told us his life stories over and over again and I never got tired of hearing them. My favorite story that he told me was how I was named after his mother Laura. When Caleb was born, he sent me a silver cup that had belonged to him as a child… It had his initials “ELD” engraved on one side and on the other side he had “CJS” engraved. I went up one year for Thanksgiving and we had a small feast that was nice and simple and we both looked back over the years and agreed that it was one of the better Thanksgivings that we had both had. I miss him so much… and I often think about how there is so much to talk to him about… I’ve actually sat alone and spoken aloud to him about various things. I wish I had more time with him… I wish that my boys could have known him like I did.
It was a beautiful weekend and a beautiful memorial.
