When I was a young boy and our extended family gathered to celebrate holidays, it was common for the adults to congregate in the dining room and play pinochle while we kids romped around the yard or (when it was raining) watched The Hopalong Cassidy Show on our 19” DuMont TV consol. But not always. Sometimes my uncle Vic would break away from the adults and teach me a trick or two. I often wondered why my uncle so readily slipped away from the rest of the adults—just to spend time with a kid. One day, long after he had passed away, I asked my mother why Uncle Vic was as likely to spend time with me as he was to mingle with his peers. “Don’t you know what happened to your uncle?” my mother asked.
