June 22

…is the birthday of my sister’s boyfriend. Well, yeah, stupid word: “boyfriend” but I can’t be arsed to do better tonight. He and my darling sister are both dead now. He outlived her by over a year, although he was a decade plus older.
He was ….i wanna say a polyglot, but that doesn’t sound as good s “polymath”…still what I’m getting at is that, in spite of being raised just a regular monoglot American, he could and did pick up any language he wanted.

He was kinda…scary. To me. When they visited here, my sister’s childhood home where I still live, everything had to be arranged around HIS schedule, HIS tastes. I was in awe of his intellect, and I was always so happy if I could make him laugh! He loved literature, knew a lot of poetry by heart, (though not as much as my sister and me).
They were together for ..I reckon 40 years. He was still married and his first wife knew about the relationship. OK, impossible to explain and I won’t try. He loved my sister. . He was so into her that he could finish MY sentences.
My only sadness is that in this relationship, she didn’t become a mother, she’da been so great at that and gotten so much pleasure! But I know she didn’t miss what she hadn’t had. She had chosen her man.
I hope they are together now, translating poetry, laughing about the passing scene. I hope they can read this.

My dear brother-out-law, I miss you, and happy birthday.