How do you thank someone who was instrumental in defining your life, who set you on a path marked by heartbreak and joy that has stretched across almost 40 years?
My Aunt Jane died Thursday morning in her Denver home surrounded by her daughters and my uncle. Her death was not unexpected, but when my brother called to deliver the news, my heart felt as though it had been wrapped in heavy chains and left to sink into sadness.
When I was in my mid-teens, a lot of people looked at me and saw a long-haired, pimply, spoiled kid. Not Aunt Jane. She saw someone who preferred books over people and who was quick with a probing question or smart-mouthed remark.
In her relentlessly optimistic way, my aunt took my rough, unformed interests and plugged them into her own interest in journalism. For all I knew, she took a few journalism courses and tallied up a handful of bylines.
But she talked about sniffing out news and writing on deadline like a veteran news writer and she talked about it with me. With no clue what I wanted to do in life or even what I wanted to study after high school, she painted a picture of journalism as a globe-trotting profession with excitement waiting around every corner.
In my mind, I saw her blond hair unfurling in the wind as she drove a convertible through the streets of Paris, a copy of Le Monde or the International Herald Tribune lying on the passenger seat, a Gauloises burning in the ashtray.
At an age when I couldn’t tell you what I was going to be doing the following summer, my aunt glimpsed my future. She gushed with excitement when I told her I was writing for my high school newspaper and she kept her Republican sensibilities in check when I told her all about how I worked up the courage to ask Rosalyn Carter a question during a press conference.
During my days as an opinionated know-it-all attending college in Boston, she ignored my prickly personality and embraced my descriptions of college courses I liked and freelance writing.
Throughout my career, her voice brimming with encouragement and her inexhaustible reserve of laughter made me feel special and, much more important, made me ask how I could pass on what I liked best about my work to other people.
The last time I saw my aunt was a year ago on my mother’s birthday. I took time during dinner to thank her for the encouragement she gave me throughout my career and credited her with inspiring me to pursue it.
She laughed in that special way people who are truly happy laugh, and said, “Oh dear, that’s awful nice of you to say,” as if she owed me a thank you and not the other way around.
Thank you, Aunt Jane.
Thor Jourgensen can be reached at [email protected].
