My Heroes

My Godfather is my mother’s older brother Noel Francis. When I was growing up in Detroit, his family lived about 60 miles north, in Fenton. I can remember loving to go visit them because they lived next to the family graveyard and had a cabin-cruiser boat at the lake. I also remember thinking how cool it was that they had a bar in the basement and the floor was a shuffleboard court.

My Uncle Noel has always been a fun loving party monster; I seldom remember seeing him without a cold drink in one hand, a smoldering Camel in the other, and a big smile on his face.

When I was about 13, my brother Doug and I took our first plane trip from NYC to Detroit to stay with them for the summer. I am sure he paid for it, as there was no way in Hell my family could have. While we were visiting, a friend of theirs who lived on the lake, went out of town for a few weeks — so we house-sat his lake house. It was then I knew I would need to live on a lake when I grew up. I also remember that while we were there the very last episode of “The Fugitive” ran. It was a very big deal.

It was on this trip that I noticed that his family had much nicer stuff than we did, they were less stressed out than we were, he always had a new car (while when we had a car it often would break down somewhere), and that Uncle Noel had a lot of friends that visited often. Now sometimes a kid’s interpretation is not exactly what reality is — but it sure seemed like they were having a better time than we were. It was then that I realized that he was making good money because he had worked hard to move up the corporate ladder for the same company his entire working career. He was a manager at General Motors (retired maybe 20 years ago) and would leave for work at 5AM each morning.

A few years later, he moved his family to Lake Fenton and we would visit every couple of years as our vacation. Some of the best times of my life were staying with them and going out on his pontoon boat. My cousins Mike, Lynn and Brad are some of the best people you will ever meet.

He and my Aunt Wilma moved to a lake in Hot Springs Village after they retired. My wife, kids, and I would visit them about once a year for those pontoon boat rides and excellent dinners. They have since moved back to Michigan to be closer to Lynn and Brad.

My Uncle Noel is a good and generous man. He is very Catholic, reads from the Bible first thing each morning, and goes to church a couple times a week. They have always supported the church with a fat weekly envelope. From him I have learn that you help family that are less fortunate than you, and that hard work (with a plan), dedication, and company loyalty will pay off.

I am happy to report that my uncle has completely given up drinking and smoking so he can extend his time with his family — but that he still always has that smile on his face. I hope he makes it to a hundred!

Epilogue

Note: I originally wrote the above back in 1996. Sadly, I need to report that my Godfather lost his battle with cancer in March 2005, less than six months after his eldest son Michael had died.

I am thankful to have been able to visit with him a week before he died, and to let him know that I loved him and that he was my biggest hero.

I have an ancestry web site, which quite honestly has been neglected in the last few years. I hope to be able to convince the people who were closest to him, and knew him best (his wife, brother, sister, cousin, and children), will document their memories of Uncle Noel so that future generations of my family will know of him.