My New Dependent

My family is small. Very small. In fact, I am the only person I know of, outside of my twin sister, who does not have a single first cousin.

I have two uncles - my mom's brother is married and has no children. The other, my dad's brother, is Gruncle.

Gruncle, as BENRY calls him, is short for Great Uncle. He's a character study - an extraordinarily intelligent man who designed submarines for 30+ years on the east coast and never found anyone smart enough with whom to discuss nuclear fusion (or is it fission?) and philately. So he never married.

You'd think that a man of such high profile who was never encumbered by wives, second wives, kids, stepkids or deadbeat half-brothers of any of the above just may have stockpiled some pretty cool stuff as he journeyed through life. You'd be wrong.

Gruncle is one American who didn't simply ignore George Bush's "Ownership Society", he utterly renounced it. He has rented the same bottom floor of a duplex for over 30 years. He has never owned a car. He doesn't buy food for his refrigerator. For all I know, he leases his clothes. And no, he does not live in a major city where you have to sell your organs to make rent.

What Gruncle does do is collect stamps and travel - not to Thailand like most single, middle-aged men in his situation, but to Minnesota to visit his tiny family on holidays and BENRY's birthdays.

During Gruncle's most recent visit, he said to me as I was leaving for work, "Keep bringing in those bucks! I'm beginning to draw Social Security and need you out there." We had a good laugh about it, but as I drove to work I considered how much loot a guy could accumulate over the years with no wife, kids, car or mortgage, nor any hooker, drug or gambling addictions to feed. I figured it was right around a trillion dollars.

Now if someone with a trillion dollars is counting on me to support him, I concluded that maybe, just maybe, this country is in for a rude awakening in 20 years.

Think I'll go have a beer.