Hugo passed away night before last. He was a 91. Hugo was a good guy, bing dutch fellow, widowed then married to my Grandmother Eula on my mother’s side. He made model train sets the size of bedrooms. He liked n and z scale. There was a z scale set encased in a glass on all sides coffee table in his house (a house which he built himself). His miniatures continue to inspire me. It makes more sense now that I get miniature ideas periodically. He tended to sit in this orange chair in his living room, where to his right over a creamsicle patterned couch hung a painting of his canal in Denmark. He would point to it every other visit, making note that ‘there’s his house right there’. He had this cat he called fuzzpot, which weighed twenty pounds. My sister and I were sure he was calling the cat fuzzbutt, which we relished. He and Eula made a good couple. Hugo was kindly if not kind of aloof. On a recent trip to Florida my family and I made the rounds, on the basis I that Eula had just had a stroke, Hugo had been diagnosed with cancer, and Grammy was nearby and always worth seeing (how does she stay in such good health? Jk, I know- she swims.). Eula looked like she’d seen a ghost, but otherwise in good health. I love her. Hugo looked good, and also like he’d only been thinking of death since his diagnosis, and maybe before that too. He went to the doctor who’d told him that it hurt to get out of the chair because he wasn’t exercising, however, on his more recent visit, it was found cancer throughout his legs. Fuzzbutt died of cancer I presume. It was ancient by the time we ever knew it. I held Hugo’s hand while we talked. He looked at me having contemplated death. Death was on his mind, I could tell. I felt the fat of his hand, distinct and floating from his ligaments and bones. Big fatty hands, lots of skin, relaxed callouses, waning strength. His spirit was crystal clear though, and he seemed like he was transferring spirit as best whether superstition be valid or not as he could, and we looked at one another and I was proud of him. It was between 3am and 6am sometime. He’d made it past his ninetieth birthday by a year.
