My Brother Jim
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Judy and Jim at Camp Jackpine for Judy's 50th birthday celebration
Dear Brother Jim, Uncle Jim, Grandpa, Husband, and otherwise friend or foe,
It was just a week ago that you took your last breath while lying in the most beautiful and comfortable death bed probably ever fabricated by dear Kenji, Cal Jim, and Bob. The windows were open letting in the sound of the waterfall.
Now where on earth would you get a waterfall in the flat woods near Bond Lake? It didn’t come naturally. So you pulled it out of thin air. Like Mickey Mouse with his magic wand in the cartoon when he made buckets of water slosh and dance on their own with the toss of his magic wand.
Your philosophy has often been—easier to ask forgiveness than permission. But that wasn’t even an issue for you, because you never considered asking permission. You just did stuff.
About twenty years ago I was taking a walk in the back forty near Bond Lake when I came upon mass destruction —the forest was ravaged. Pines and oaks lay bowled over with their stumps exposed. It looked like a tornado had passed through. What on earth happened here? I wondered. I was devastated to see the precious trees smattered to rubble.
By the end of the summer it was all cleaned up, the crumpled ground smoothed over, and grass and wildflower seeds planted. You had an instant seventeen acre prairie. Then you bulldozed a hill together so a pond could be dug and you scooped out a stream bed and placed rocks strategically so the water could flow to make the sweetest of sounds.
Later you would open the window, sit in your overstuffed chair, and listen to the creek while the summer breeze blew on your pages of American history books. That was when you couldn’t get enough of the late 1800’s, your thirst for knowledge, uncontained, then and throughout your seventy-nine year life.
In order to get the water to flow over the stream bed you imported a Disney crew to make it happen. They installed a hidden pump—to be turned on with a switch inside the cabin—to push the water in a large circle around the land, from the pond to the streams over the dry sandy wooded land and back around again.
The Prairie house— jonathan chapman
On first appearance your prairie house is an 1800’s cabin fashioned after a Terry Redlands painting. There’s the black shiny cook stove, a light hanging by a wire, and wooden cupboards with little bronze latches on the windowed doors showing the backlit china cups and plates. To not impair ambience, you cleverly hid the modern conveniences. It might take a person days to figure out how to find the turn-on knobs at the back of the old fashioned cook-stove or to discover the refrigerator, hidden within pine counters.
When you were nineteen, you told me, you were going door to door selling encyclopedias. You had your books and sign-up forms in hand as you walked up the road to an Illinois farm house set on an expansive prairie. The grasses were blowing in soft waves. You knocked but no one answered. You checked the door and it clicked open, you peeked inside and hollered a Hello. Still quiet, you invited yourself in. You stood there in the middle of the living room. It was a balmy summer day. The open windows blowing in the smell of newly mown hay. The white curtains ruffling from the breeze. That vision burned a love-spot into your brain that would be the inspiration for your prairie house twenty years later. The prairie house is a stunning work of art, just one shining example of your artistic genius.
the prairie house— jonathan chapman
Not many could understand where you were going with your ideas and what story was driving your visions. You didn’t have time to explain. Perhaps you didn’t want anyone to oppose, get in your way, or give you advice. Your persistent refrain—trust me on this.
When I got divorced you were the first family member I told. I was nervous to call you. This was a big deal. I sat in my garden on a wrought-iron chair and dialed your number. I told you we were splitting up. You listened to me. You said you were sorry. You felt the sadness with me. You didn’t ask why as I cried on the phone. You didn’t give advice. You just gave your kind love, and support when I needed it the most. I won’t forget how present you were that morning. I was filled with love from my big brother. You were there for me.
Summer sunset on Bond Lake
Since you died, several people have told me similar stories they have had with you. At least two family members said, I was in a bad way, Jim saved my life. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for Jim.
When I became single, you took me under your wing. Within two months, you invited me to a Butterfield and Robinson bike tour with chateaus and vineyards in southern France. In the mornings, there would be my bike, the dew wiped off the seat and a Toblerone chocolate clipped to the frame. At the end of our 30 mile treks, we dined in the chateau on French cheese and wine. I laid my head on the crispest, yet softest French linen pillow, not long and narrow like in the states, but a perfect square of pure fluff. Even though I was in bed alone, the edges around the hole in my heart started to fill.
A few months later, you invited me to Las Vegas. We took a cab to see Cirque Du Soleil and arrived five minutes before show time. “Sold out!” the cashier announced. You flashed your associated-press pass, pointed to me and said, “I’ve got the senator from Utah with me.” The usher led us down the aisle. I slithered into my front row seat, hands in my pockets, fingers crossed that no one would ask me for an autograph.
You liked to drive really fast so you needed three licenses from three states. Your traffic tickets probably gummed up the works at the department of motor vehicles as they tried to track you down.
You never waited in line. Your time was too precious. You lived life like you were killing snakes, but always methodical, always with a process and a plan. Patience was not your strong point and according to Gina, neither was domestic engineering.
Dear brother of mine, you were the ultimate yin and yang. Shot full of passion, fury, and zest. So entirely sure of your self. This focus and confidence was the gas that powered you through life to create many successful businesses, poems, books, a fleet of sports cars, many cabins, a lodge, and hell, by some flip of your wand, you even became a clinical professor.
I was grateful and privileged to be with you in your final hours. You told me that you weren’t afraid to die. You’d done everything you wanted to do. In your forties, you felt differently but now life goes full circle, it’s a mosaic, you said. You told me the story that dad told about planned obsolescence and how it was a good thing. Dad had said to you, “Jim, it’s a good thing that we die. You know how you get wiser and wiser as the years go by? Could you imagine doing business with a guy that was a hundred and ten? He’d have eyes of coal that burned right through ya.”
When I heard your life was nearing the end, dear Jim, the past hurts between us just slipped away and I was blessed to remember the many beautiful and gracious things you have done for me. And how you took such good care of me as your little sister.
Jim's motor coach for early morning trips with a pile of kids to get a pile of pancakes in minong.
I didn’t consider you would have a natural death, like most people. I thought you might shoot yourself up into a giant firework over Bond Lake and explode in a blaze of glory, but here you lay on your death bed like a normal human and here you slowly slipped away. It was an honor to be with you during these final hours, to hold your hand, and I hope to give you a bit of comfort.
I felt mom’s spirit swirling around ready to take you home. I hope on the other side you will behave and not give mom the starts and stops that she had to deal with when you were a young’un. I know she is glad to have you home. She was the one person who truly believed you could do no wrong.
Dearest Jim, I am surprised at how much I have cried this past week. Your spirit is strong. You made an indelible impact on those that you left behind. I love your passion for life. I know you hated to be alone and I am grateful that you had family by your side all through your sickness. Just four weeks from diagnosis till death. Just like you, to do it fast and furious. I love you my big brother. Your footprint thunders and echoes on Chicago’s sidewalks, down hallways, through silent forests, across impossible oceans, and up and down County Road T. Shine on….big brother… shine on…
