Thwack! . . . Thwack! . . . Thwack! Steven Arthur Mills slappedthe marble desk in front of Roseville High School's scienceclass with a yardstick. All eyes suddenly fastened on him. Hesensed that we were getting bored with learning, and he wasn'tabout to let that happen. Black-framed glasses highlighted my uncle's hearty face. Wispywhite hair topped his head. He was mild-mannered and excessivelypolite, but when teaching, he was a wild-eyed scientist, anatural showman, who taught in dramatic fashion withexperiments, explosions, and flair.
It was a thrill to be in his class. We watched in awe when UncleSteve dropped potassium in a glass of water. It ignited andskipped in circles over the water's surface. We sculpted glasswith Bunsen burners. He taught us chemical equations by blowingup hydrogen - poof! And everything was always done underconditions of extreme safety. We saw the fascinating sides ofphysics with pendulums, levers, and lenses.But Steven Arthur Mills didn't limit his teaching to theclassroom. Some of my earliest memories from childhood are of myUncle Steve teaching me new things at family gatherings.
UncleSteve was the answer man."Why is ice hard?""Why is toilet bowl cleaner poisonous?""Why does ammonia smell so strong?" His answers were always patient, logical, and scientific, and asa kid, I asked a million questions, because he talked to me likeI was an adult. Uncle Steve would pull out a slide rule (thiswas the 1960s, before calculators were common) and help me domath problems in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner. We had these"conferences" at every family activity. Once, before arriving ata family event, my dad pulled me aside and said, "Don't botherUncle Steve the whole time.
Other people want to talk to himtoo." I was shocked and hurt. To be cut off from Uncle Steve wasa crisis.I found Uncle Steve and pulled on his pant's leg. "Can I ask youlots of questions?" I asked."Of course," he said. "I don't know much, but I'll tell you whatI know," he said humbly.Thank God! I felt like an important person when I was aroundUncle Steve. Uncle Steve would bring my brothers, my sister, andour cousins, all sorts of educational toys. "What are you doing, giving a, Two Way Walkie Talkie Products, little kid that age a radio kit,"I once heard one of the adults ask him, thinking such toys weretoo advanced for our years.
But Uncle Steve was right. His gifts inspired us to do thingsbeyond all expectations. Once one kid built something difficult,like soldering a walkie-talkie together, everyone tried to dothe same. He never challenged us to master difficult things; hesimply let curiosity take its course. He let us discover howgreat learning can be. By the time I got to high school we whipped through Newton andEinstein. Uncle Steve gave everyone the Periodic Table of theElements and showed us tricks about how to use it.
I lovedscience and math, because Uncle Steve introduced us to conceptsand experiments that intrigued us. Importantly, my class lefthigh school prepared for college. While I was away in medical school, Uncle Steve was diagnosedwith prostate cancer. He was given estrogen therapy and diedsuddenly from a heart attack at age 73. We had agreed forseveral years that he would attend my graduation and he missedit, by only three months.His death was devastating for me. I might never have gone tomedical school if not for his influence.
The worst blow was thatI came realize his treatment for prostate cancer had probablykilled him. He was given estrogen for his prostate cancer, andtoday we know that estrogen in the high doses given back thenoften causes heart attacks, and my Uncle Steve suffered asudden, massive one. Years passed and four of my five siblingsgot married giving me a brother-in-law and three newsisters-in-law. Seemingly overnight, my older brothers fatheredfive children, and my sister bore five, for a total of tenyoungsters with ten new personalities.
Being an uncle to five girls and five boys was something I wasunprepared for because I was single. Did I have a role to playin the lives of my nieces and nephews? Suddenly, I had questionswithout answers and didn't know how to behave. It's difficult tocall on the telephone. Who has the time during internship andresidency? And it's so hard to call at the right time to afamily with little kids who are napping or going to bed early.To my surprise, I discovered a way to reach out to my nieces andnephews.
I often received free promotional knick-knacks at workwhether I wanted them or not. When given a free gadget, Ipromptly shipped it to niece or nephew. I sent them pens,penlights, magnets, popping buttons, cheap watches, postcards,and other thingamabobs. Because the closest kids lived over 200miles away from me, the mail was often the only way for me tomake my existence known to them.What excited responses I got! Several times I received callsfrom children giggling with delight and thanking me for thegifts that I sent them.
Several times I got a call from anamazed brother, or my sister, who couldn't believe how much funone of the children was having with a flashlight or some otherobject. Mailing stuff reminded me of how Uncle Steve always gaveus science toys when I was a kid. Their reactions meant a lot tome, but I came up with other ideas too.In fact, as time went by, my favorite duty became teachingvocabulary."Uncle Brad, you're sesquipedalian!" Laurel shouted into thephone one day when we talked. My six-year-old niece had stumpedme with that word.
I was totally surprised by it. I marveled athow fast blonde-haired Laurel, the oldest of the children, waslearning. "It means you like to use big words," she informed me."Oh," I replied, smiling.Big words are my hobby. I started trying to expand my vocabularyafter being hit by a drunk driver. After being unconscious, Ifelt mentally cloudy and learning new words was part of myrehabilitation. I unabashedly used newly learned words around myfamily. I always made sure that I had some big words ready whenI was visiting my nieces or nephews.
One summer the entire family was visiting grandma and grandpa'shouse. All the children were there, and I was ready for myperformance."Unbelievable," I cried out, "There's a rampike in the yard!" Ilike to make a big, dramatic, production out of everythingeducational like my Uncle Steve used to do. "Look, there itis—the rampike—right outside our window!" "Oh no, here we go again, Uncle Brad," Laurel said, rolling hereyes."What's a rampike?" asked Andrew."A rampike?" Nathan repeated. "Isn't it incredible?
" I said dramatically. Like my Uncle Stevebefore me, I have no intention of being boring while teachingsomething. I kept staring out the window for a moment pointingwith my finger. I checked my young audience, and even shy Douglas from Altanta,only three years old, and still unfamiliar with his cousins, waslooking out the window. Everyone old enough to respond to myhijinks had done so. All the little faces wore attentiveexpressions."A rampike is a dead tree, especially one that has been burned,"I told everyone.
"Your dad taught me that word," I told Douglasin my sensational educational tone as I pointed outside. "Seewhere the lightning hit and burned the tree, leaving it withoutleaves and scarred. So, a rampike is a dead tree. Thisparticular one was killed by lightning," I emphasized."A rampike," Laurel said. "A rampike," Douglas said. "Rampike!" Andrew screamed. One by one they enunciated the alien word. They had gotten it.They had learned a new word. I could see their self-esteemgrowing because they had learned something that only adults knew!
Later, I was playing with Laurel. We were searching for bigwords in a book when her younger brother Nathan came by, lookinga little left out, sparking a memory from my own childhood. Myfamily was large and as a kid I sometimes felt lost in the crowdat family events, until I discovered my Uncle Steve.And another thought from my mother about raising six kids rangin my head: You multiply your love; you don't divide it."Okay Nathan," I said, eager to include him in our game. "Youcan find some big words in this book too.
" "Uncle Brad," he giggled."Come on, find one," I encouraged him."But I can't even read yet, I'm only four," he said cheerfully.He was right of course. So I picked up the book, and we startedlearning to read. He was "tickled pink" to see what big wordswere. This incident would lead to other adventures.On March 21, 1992, I was best man at my youngest brother Steve'swedding. My brother was named after our Uncle Steve. Before hepassed away, my Uncle Steve used to photograph all our familyweddings. He had been enthusiastic about taking pictures, andeveryone enjoyed his photographs immensely.
Now the trend wasfor weddings to be videotaped. "Nathan," I said, "when the video cameraman comes over here,say, 'This sure is obfuscatory.'""What?" he pondered."Ob-fus-ca-tor-y," I carefully enunciated. "What's that mean?"he blurted."It means it's confusing," I said with enough gleam in my eye sothat he knew that I meant to have some fun.The man with the video camera headed our way and Nathannervously anticipated the moment."And what do you think, young man?" he said to Nathan, as hefocused the camera on him.
"It's all obfuscatory to me!" he shouted. "That means it sure isconfusing!"The cameraman was startled and delighted. He had just capturedone of those unexpectedly hilarious moments on tape. Theincident reminded me of how my Uncle Steve would get his wholeclass excited about learning by doing something dramatic.Once the phenomenon of big words started, it steamrolled andquickly came right back at me. "You're being avuncular," my sister Nancy said. "What'savuncular?" I asked."It means acting like an uncle," she said.
"This is going to get out of control," I said."Yeah, but it's fun," she said.A few months later, my Aunt Lucille and my Aunt Katherine wereover for a birthday party. "You're just nonchalant about allthis fuss, aren't you, Nathan?" my Aunt Lucille said to him. I seized this opportunity. After all, Nathan's Great AuntKatherine was there, and it was her husband, my Uncle Steve, whohad really gotten me interested in learning as a child. I tookNathan aside and told him, "Tell her you're insouciant, notnonchalant.
" We rehearsed the word a time or two and Nathan ranback to Great Aunt Lucille at the dining table. "I'm insouciant!""What's that mean?" she questioned.Nathan ran back to me for the meaning and then back to thetable. "It means I'm happy and carefree," he shouted. ThenNathan smiled, drew one leg up in the air, curled his armstoward his small chest, broke into hysterics of laughter, andhis cheeks turned beet red. The adults guffawed from his uniquecontortion of joy. When I looked around, I saw a smile on Aunt Katherine's face.
Her husband, my Uncle Steve, was responsible for the joy on herface.One day when most of the family was home, Andrew, now aclear-eyed six-year old who was stretching up in height, said,"Uncle Brad, let's talk about important science stuff now!" WhenI heard this, tears rimmed my eyes. I had said the exact samewords to my Uncle Steve when I was a child.My thoughts went skyward and rested on heaven. I had come fullcircle since my Uncle Steve entered my life. He was a teacherand had inspired me to learn important science stuff when I wasa kid.
I badgered him with questions, and he never let me down.I mattered when I was around him, and learning was fun. My Uncle Steve had prepared me for much more than science andmath. He had taught me how to be an uncle. His life had answeredthe one question that I had never thought to ask him when he wasalive. - by Bradley Hennenfent, M.D., author of the new book:"Surviving Prostate Cancer Without Surgery." "Surviving Prostate Cancer Without Surgery" can be found in finebookstores everywhere. Biblio Distribution (800-462-6420) andRoseville Books/Rayve Productions (888-492-2665) distribute thebook.