Five years ago today, my cousin murdered my uncle. He used a gun- and no, I don’t hate guns because of it, the root cause of the murder was not the availability of weapons, but the combination of alcohol, drugs, and mental health issues.

My uncle, late in life, had come to look uncannily like my father. When he died, it was as if I was burying Dad all over again.

Below the fold is the eulogy I delivered and the photograph to which it refers.

The only picture I have of my father is also a picture of my uncle Richard. I look at the faces of Dad and Uncle Richard to begin every day of my life.

In the picture, Dad and Uncle Richard are standing on the edge of a country road; dad is playing an old sears mail-order guitar and Richard is leaning against the fender of a Studebaker Commander. They’re both wearing jeans; Dad’s are faded and Richard’s are new. The cuffs on Richards’s jeans are rolled up about two inches. They’re both smiling like the just won the lottery. They’re both far younger than I am now.

Every time I look at that picture, I think about those two men frozen in that instant in time. All their lives are ahead of them. All the joy and pain, all the hopes and sorrows. They have yet to meet the women that would become their wives, hear the laughter of their children, or open the doors on their own homes. They are all potential; they have little more than the clothes on their backs and their dreams. They have no idea what life has in store for them, and no idea what the future will bring. I sometimes wish I could climb in the back of that Studebaker and travel down that country road with them, so I can hear what they talk about, and see where they go.

Every time I look at that picture I think of the lesson it has to teach. Dad and Uncle Richard were never handed anything, had to work hard for everything. Nothing in those times came easily to anyone. They knew how hard life was, and they were smiling anyway. They had faith in the strength of their backs, faith in the strength of their convictions, and trust in The Lord. They knew that surviving depended on working together as a family, and they had firsthand experience of how families work together to survive hard times.

Every time I think I have a difficult life, I look at that picture and realize how lucky I am, and how much of it is due to the men smiling there. They faced their futures with a smile, and with the confidence that whatever came up they could handle it.

Nobody here has to be told what a good man Richard Hardig is. Everyone that knows him, knows him to be a good husband and father, a good Catholic, strong in his faith, and a decent human being. The pain of his passing is severe enough that we might forget the lesson he teaches us from the smile in that picture; We can handle this. We will move on. We’re tough enough to deal with pain like this and keep going. It will be difficult, and in times like this, it may even seem impossible, but as long as we remember the strength he had, and most importantly, the love he gave to everyone around him, we can go on.

There is no doubt that it is a colder and less welcoming world without my uncle Richard in it, it is our responsibility to carry his warmth with us in our daily lives and share it with those around us; because to live by his example is to keep him alive and with us.