Eulogy

At the funeral, these are the words that I said:

I want to take a few moments to honor my
brother Jonathan’s sense of humor. His
wife Sarah mentioned to me on the airplane
coming here that if it was Jonathan’s
particular style of joke and humor at the
office that brought the two of them
together, and that got me thinking a bit more
about it.
Jonathan had a unique and signature way
of telling a joke or a funny story. At the
age of 19 I flew back East for his
graduation from Penn and was astounded
that college had changed him - he was no
longer a California boy. He had picked up
this sharp-as-a-knife “suffer no fools”, very
Philadelphia, dry, East Coast, tell-it-like-it is,
wit. And It was very funny.
He would lean over to you real close at
unexpected times with raised eyebrows,
talking out of the side of his mouth in a low
voice, bringing you into the world of his
imperfect friends and their tragic and
hilarious misfortunes; a world of old cars
and clumsy lovers, tractor pulls, punk rock
and motorcycles.
Did Jonathan ever tell you of his cat
Oscar’s 5 nights stuck in a tree? Or his
college buddy who went to retrieve a
stolen car from a North Philly street corner?
Or how the neighbor trained his dog to stay
away from chickens? You really got to
know and love Jon through these stories.
Jonathan’s move to Washington separated
us physically but the more rural
environment really suited him. More and
more of his stories revolved around power
tools, farm animals, his latest finds on
Craig’s list, and his wife and three kids in
the middle of it all whom he loved dearly.
He just loved being “in the country”.
John was not the type of engineer who
toyed with lasers and writes computer
programs on the weekend.
When he wasn’t helping others in the
neighborhood with backyard projects, he
would scan the swap meets and classifieds
for broken power tools, pick-up trucks and
lawn tractors, because those were the
things he loved. Last I counted, John and
Sarah had four tractors in various states of
repair. One for each child, plus a spare.
There’s a story that Sarah tells of Jonathan
and another engineer driving to an
important business meeting when Jon pulls
suddenly off the road into a residential
neighborhood.
He gets out of the car, says “wait here” ,
and goes up to the front door, OUT pops
this chainsaw, Jonathan throws it into the
trunk, and off they go. All the engineer can
say is “are you out of your mind? what’s
this all about?” and Jonathan just says “I got
it for $5 off craigs list, isn’t it great?” They
get back from the meeting and Sarah asks,
how was the meeting, and he says fine,
fine, but check out this chainsaw!
I’m going to miss hearing stories of
Jonathan’s latest pickup truck or fixing
broken tools gotten for free. I’ll miss his
jokes and how he shared his humor with
me, cheered me up, and made me happy
we were part of the same family. I hope
you can take a moment today to share a
humorous story about Jon with a friend or
family member, cheer them up like he
cheered me up, and that you remember him
always.