Walt and the F-Word (Edited)

September 4. My brother won't be here   to celebrate his birthday. At least not in the usual way. It will be left to us , his  family and friends -  those who hold him dear - to celebrate the day of his birth with flowers on his grave, and a  tiny Sealtest Ice Cream truck; and  special  Masses offered for  Walter Cooney RIP+

We  reminisce about his  life with  love and  laughter and  happy stories; and an occassional bittersweet tear, wishing we could hold him close and touch his hand just one more time.

 A couple years ago Walt told our mother he thought he inherited  her same easy  temperament; that his personality was a lot like hers. I think he was right.   I was the fiery one, more cautious about allowing someone new enter our sphere.

 Recalling Walt's words to mom  made me think back to when he was 15 years old  and  asked  me to   take him and his pal, Jimmy  to the store.  "Sure",  I said, "Let's go!"    We  climbed into my   red  '65  Volkswagen ,  and off we went.

I bet we didn't drive further than  two blocks, maybe three when Jimmy made what I precieved to be an uncouth , off colored, derogatory comment about Walt.  I immediately jerked the car to a stop and told Jimmy to get out, that I didn't appreciate his colorful language , especially in reference to my brother.   Poor  Walt, he  couldn't believe I was actually telling his best  friend  to get out of the car. I'm sure  Walt was mortified.    When Jimmy just sat there, I jumped out of the car, sprint  to the other side, opened the passenger door,  grabbed his arm, and told him  in no uncertain terms to get out.  Guess I shouldn't have been surprised,  not only did Jimmy get out of the car, so did my brother.

A short time later  Walt rushed through the front door  and  yelled  out , "Mom! Mom!  You've got to tell my sister she can't boss my friends!"  As our mother  walked in from the kitchen, he yelled again  "Mom",   then abruptly turned from mom to me,  and  with finger pointing at my nose loudly  roared,   "You! Ffff. Ffff. Ffff.  FROG! "

 There stood  my little brother,   so serious and  angry,   calling me a   'Frog'.   Although,  I was sorry I upset him ,  the whole scene   just made me laugh,  not a haughty, mean  kind of laugh - but a tickled, tears rolling down the cheeks  kind of laughter.   Walt's anger was  so out of character.  It was one of those  funny moments in family life.  Maybe the kind of moment   one   has to be there to appreciate  how silly it was,   because pretty soon Walt  stopped being mad, and  was laughing, too.  Then mom started in.  So there the three of of stood,   like we were a comedy team on stage, laughing out loud at our own joke.

While Walt  may   have  wanted  to let another F-word roll off  the tip of his teen-age  tongue, he exercised self control instead ,   knowing  that  F- word would never be appropriate to use in front of his mother or sister.    For many years  afterward  I would give Walt some kind of decorative frog  for his birthday.  It kept the frog  memory alive, and was always one F-word that made us smile.