I was lucky enough to have been blessed with several great uncles. Not a “creepy uncle” stereotype in the bunch. To me, they were all like big kids. They might have been responsible for me when I was with them but they’d let me get away with stuff that my parents wouldn’t. They kept me safe and that was good enough. They didn’t make me eat right or do other stuff that kids didn’t like. To me, that’s the sign of a good uncle. They let you experience new things and see the kid side of adults that your parent might have tried to hide from you.
That’s the kind of uncle that I’m trying to be with my nieces and nephews. You want to play games? I’m up for it. Want to eat junk food? Great! Me too. You just want to talk? I’m here for you.
I had some great uncle role models and I’m going to do my best to carry on the tradition. If you have any great memories of uncles, please share them.
I had one biological uncle, who was cool, but lived out-of-state so we rarely interacted.
But I had a very close honorary uncle who was very close to the family for years and years and years, although we moved across the country just before I turned 6. One of my fondness memories of him was from when I had just turned 5. He had taken me camping once, and we were going to do it again, but the weather had turned quite bad. Instead, he set up his dome tent (which was a rare thing in those days) in the middle of his (to the child me) quite spacious second floor apartment, and we camped out there for 2 days and grilled weenies on the balcony to keep in the mood.
We also got ice cream from the fridge, which normally wouldn’t have been a part of a camping trip, so it was the best camping trip EVER to the child me for many, many years.
One of my uncles is a total nature nerd. He’s awkward as heck and probably would have been diagnosed as autistic when he was a kid if that was a thing in the 60s. We never really had any sort of relationship like the OP describes with their “cool uncle” but as an adult I really really appreciate him for all his quirks now. We talk about plants and birds, he comes over to look for butterfly eggs on my milkweed. Every so often I see something interesting in nature and text him about it. He’s goofy and fun and totally has his head in the clouds, and I appreciate him just the way he is.
@ParallelLines That’s great! Honorary uncles are awesome too. My best friend is only 22 years old. I’m 58 and I’ve known him his entire life. I’ve always treated him just like a nephew and was honored beyond belief when he asked me to be his best man.