Joey
Five days until we fly.
A lot has happened since my last entry. The death certificate arrived. It came much quicker than expected and was quite the shock. I'm not sure i was ready for it.
Opening the package, the first thing i noticed was the age Joey died. Forty eight. This is no age to die. I hadn't realised previously that he was so young. It must be an incredibly sad feeling for my Mum to know she has already out-survived him.
The next thing my eyes flicked to was the address on the certificate. This confirmed that his last place of residence was in Clarkson with Francis Stone - she was also the informant. My eyes scanned the page nervously, knowing that i was about to discover what my family had not known for many years. Then i saw it, Cirrhosis, his cause of death. It was as we had expected, his lifetime abuse of alcohol was the cause. Cirrhosis is the long term scarring of the liver through consistent alcohol consumption. The truth hadn't been so far removed from my fantasy after all. The difference is important though - unlike my over-the-top, romanticised end, a portrait of a man who had control of his drinking habits and chose to consume his life away; the reality suggests a man who had lost control. Joey was battling his habits and lost. Maybe he found solace in the bottle, maybe he didn't. I don't want to suggest anything for definite as since i can't ask him, i would only be creating a second fantasy, a second fiction. But then again, to what extent could my view of him ever be truly objective and real? Perhaps every view that we form on anyone is to some extent fictitious. It's impossible to spend every minute with everyone and also impossible to get into their heads, so we fill the gaps. It's human to imagine, it's only natural to assume things.
I have began thinking about this new information practically. I can now visit the last place he lived/died. This information haunts me a little but i know it's something i need to do. Although, it will be a strange request to whoever is living there now.
The certificate also confirms where he was laid to rest, giving the trip it's logical conclusion. I was about to file away the paper, but giving it one last read through i noticed a box i hadn't noticed previously. 'Was the decedent ever in the military? Yes'. Military? Joey? I had never heard the slightest mention of this. At what point in his life could this have happened? I guess this explains his love of guns, but i hadn't pictured him as being the military type.
Ringing up my mum, i informed her of the arrival of the certificate. She echoed some of the thoughts i had, that he was far too young and that we had suspected alcohol to be the cause. She was also equally surprised about the discovery of his being in the military, telling me she would dig through her's and my gran's old letters to see what she could find.
A few days later, i found myself in Cheshire. My Mum had amassed a huge amount of new information on Joey's life. Firstly, was that he had been in the navy, although we still didn't know when. In the letters, he talks about how he sometimes wished that he could re-enlist. He served on the Kitty Hawk - a famous USS supercharger named after the site of the first powered aeroplane flight. He spoke of his friendship with some of the jump jet pilots.
Secondly, and i was incredibly excited to find this out - he did in fact play jazz music!!! When living in Reno, he played the saxophone and trumpet. There's no evidence that this was ever professional or even with a full band, but he did talk about how he used to jam with one of the drummers from Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons (he doesn't say which one and there were quite a few, so i'm unsure who exactly).