There is one brother in all the siblings that my parents have, and you’re looking at him.

He was christened Winthrop, but we always knew him as “Uncle Laddie.” He passed away in the mid-1990’s after a battle with cancer interrupted a very full, exciting life.

One of the memorable things about Laddie was that if he knew you, he always described you as the best, most wonderful people with all the best connections and the most important job and the best…you get the picture. Everyone was special in Laddie’s world.

His sister, my mother, really liked this (mostly) unrelated joke:

There’s a family with five kids and they have a dog named Laddie. The kids worship that dog. They really lived up to their promise to take care of the dog and so they pick up after him and they walk him and play with him and feed him. They adore Laddie.

One day, the kids are at school and Laddie gets out the front door, is struck by a car, and is killed. The mom is distraught. What is she going to say to those kids when they come home from school? They’re going to be traumatized!

So the kids come home and mom gets them gathered ’round and says, “Now, something bad has happened, and you’re going to be sad for a while and you’ll always love him but you have to know that everything is going to be okay and I promise that we can get another one. I’m so sorry to tell you that Laddie was hit by a car today and is dead.”

The kids look at her for a minute and then ask if they can go out and play. Confused, she says yes but as they scamper out the door she realizes this is wrong and calls them back to her.

“Kids, I don’t think you understand what I’m saying here. Laddie died today. Do you understand what that means?”

All of a sudden the kids’ faces grow white with shock and they burst into tears.

“LADDIE! WE THOUGHT YOU SAID ‘DADDY!'”

What the heck is she doing now?

© E. Stocking Evans 2016