Today I am thankful for Nuncle Steve.

11.27.2020

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I’ve been thinking about my Uncle Steve a lot the past couple of days. He’s my mom’s youngest brother and a seriously, seriously cool uncle. I always looked forward to his visits when I was a kid. There were a number of years when he lived in Minneapolis and would come to visit us in Wisconsin for a long weekend or a holiday. I vividly remember a Thanksgiving or two with Uncle Steve around our table. We’d go bowling together as a family on the day after Thanksgiving and I remember being very impressed at what a good bowler he was. Thinking back now, I’m not sure if he really was a good bowler or not, but in my 10-year-old eyes Uncle Steve pretty much walked on water.

Uncle Steve was in town one weekend when I was working on a science assignment. I had to transform a shoe box into an insulator for an ice cube. We were going to have a competition in school on Monday to see whose ice cube lasted the longest. Steve helped me make a Styrofoam insulator for my ice cube – perfectly cut and sized for my shoe box. I tied for first in the ice cube contest and I remember proudly telling my teacher that I had a real, live engineer as my advisor.

Steve was the kind of Uncle who made everything fun. As a college student I remember visiting Steve and my Aunt Deanna in St. Louis and him serving flaming bananas foster for desert one random Tuesday night. He was known for his well-choreographed lighting of sparklers and the tiki torches at 4th of July and

was always game for a fun costume or a silly contest. Steve and Deanna made many trips to Arizona as well, which gave me the blessing of having many wonderful memories with Steve in my adult years too. Many were as light hearted and fun as the ones I had as a child, but I also got to appreciate him as a really cool, incredibly smart, and very kind man.

Truly, I have too many memories to count. Steve was the best. He acquired the nickname “Nuncle Steve” during one of our many competitive family game nights playing the Dictionary Game. Turns out that “nuncle” is a British derivative of the word uncle. Once my sister and I learned this, the name stuck.

Nuncle Steve died in the spring of 2009 after a battle with cancer. I can still remember where I was sitting and what I was wearing when my mom called to tell me that he had died. I was crushed. I still miss him. A lot. But I’m forever grateful for all of the amazing memories I have with him.

I put my Christmas tree up a couple of weeks ago, but I didn’t decorate it until tonight. I hung my Nuncle Steve angel ornament on the tree like I do every year, and smiled as I did so, thinking about my cool, fun, silly, loving Nuncle. I’m blessed and very thankful to have been his niece.