My Uncle Alfred, who I mentioned the other day, My father's brother, just weeks ago lost his wife to years of smoking, had heart heart failure himself and was in ICU for days. The Doctors said he was in bad shape, then miraculously he got better and they were going to release him from the hospital...

...However, he died.

It was quite a shock. The Lentz Family isn't doing well. We are all falling apart.

Al was my dad's youngest sibling, so I identified with him a bit because I'm the youngest of my brothers.

When I was young I stayed with him when he lived in Little Rock. He seemed so cool to me then, but later he began drinking heavily and I became scared of him and annoyed by him.

There was one time when I was about 12 years old and an older man said something about me that evidently wasn't good, I didn't hear it, but Alfred heard him and I thought he was going to kill the guy. Really, kill the guy.

That was the coolest thing ever!

I should be back in Missouri now, but things aren't working for me that way. There is pressure on me to be there, helping with things, my dad's illness, all the stuff that needs to be done to get his house in order and preparing for his death.

Missouri seems so far away.