Fight For Height

While my uncle, Wayne Byer was the younger of the two sons of my grandparents, George and Hattie Byer, he was also the taller of the two boys. That became a bit of a competition between the brothers. It wasn’t that Uncle Larry Byer could do anything about it, but that didn’t stop him from trying. The difference in their height was not huge, probably an inch or two. I don’t know for sure, but I do know that if Uncle Larry stood on his tip toes, he could be pretty close to Uncle Wayne’s height. To add to the situation, the boys were quite humorous. In fact, they were very much tricksters.

Never was that more evident that at one particular Christmas party held in the late 70s. For that particular party, a photographer had been hired to take some family pictures. The pictures turned out great, but there was something going on in one of the pictures that most of us didn’t know about. I suppose that the siblings knew about it when they saw the pictures, but the cousins probably did not. In fact, I didn’t know anything about it until recently when my Aunt Sandy Pattan told me why her older brothers seemed to be sharing a secret amusement. It seems that Uncle Larry was standing with his heels on the edge of a piece of molding, probably the mopboard. In the picture, the effect was that the two brothers appear to be close to the same height, if not exactly the same height. The only hint that something is “off” is that the brothers couldn’t keep a straight face. Both of them had a sheepish grin on their face, that told you that something funny was going on. For years, I thought that they must have saif something funny, but that wasn’t it at all. Uncle Larry was standing there, as tall as he could, and Uncle Wayne caught it out of the corner of his eye, knowing that even on tip toe, his brother couldn’t quite make it to his height.

It’s funny how two known comics, like my uncles, even as adult men, couldn’t resist goofing off…even during a photo shoot. We wonder why kids like to make funny faces or jokes when pictures are being taken, and we’ve even come to expect it from them, but somehow we figure that adults can keep their composure and “behave themselves” for the camera, but it isn’t always so, especially when two of the siblings are the comics of the crew. And my uncles were definitely the comics of the crew. Today is Uncle Wayne’s 88th birthday. Happy birthday Uncle Wayne!! Have a great day!! We love you!!