A eulogy for my brother, who died on April 19, 2025 at the age of 72.
Bernie and I were six years apart.
He was in high school when I was still finishing grade school.
He started college before I started high school.
But, for a while, when we were young, we spent a lot of time together.
We shared a bedroom when we lived in Cicero and for a couple of years here, in Louisville.
He was my big brother, so, of course, everything he did was cool.
He had a rebellious streak. That was reflected in the music he listened to when he was young, the friends he sought out, and the adventures he created for himself.
Sometimes, he’d get me in trouble.
I remember roughhousing and hitting dad’s aquarium with my head and the fish and water going everywhere.
I remember at night, when we were supposed to be sleeping, calling each other stupid names. He’d have me laughing so hard that dad would storm into our bedroom.
He was athletic as a young man, playing soccer and football in high school – and long past his amateur playing days, he remained an avid sports fan. He was so excited when his beloved Bears won the Super Bowl in 1986.
Bernie attended Eastern Kentucky University, but didn’t make it past freshman year. He was arrested for possessing hashish, a felony in 1971. Today, in states like mine, cannabis products are legal.
As you know, things you do when you’re young can change the trajectory of your life, but you either push ahead – or you don’t.
Bernie pushed ahead. Of course, he had a lot of people pushing him along the way too.
Bernie was remarkably resilient and enterprising. He had so many kinds of jobs, I’m sure I’ve forgotten most.
He worked as a criminal investigator for the public defender in Nashville for most of the 1980s. But he also had a creative bent. He teamed up with a couple of Brits on a motion picture project. I don’t think the film was ever completed, but it got a lot of buzz in 1982 after The Tennessean said it was going to be the Music City’s first rock ’n’ roll film.
When he went to St. Croix, he worked for a company involved in launching a triathlon there. Things in the Virgin Islands went south for Bernie after Hurricane Hugo ravaged the Caribbean in 1989. Later, Bernie worked as a contractor. Managed crews that did industrial coating. I think that was one of his last Wyoming gigs.
I went to college in St. Louis a couple years after Bernie married Debbie. We stayed in touch, but mostly we focused on our families and living in different cities and worlds.
Back before the internet, when people used to write letters, we’d correspond. I saved a few of his letters. They show his funny side, but they’re not the sort of thing you read in church. Too many off-color references.
But he did write this to me: “I love the expletive out of you and am proud to have you as my brother. You’re even enough of a man – just barely – to make me proud to have you for a friend.”
Bernie could be frustrating, but there was no question about his heart. He always meant to do the best; he always rebuked himself for when he fell short. He hated the idea of owing anybody anything.
I don’t think he fully appreciated what he did give us – lasting happy and priceless memories.
Here are a few of mine:
I remember a brother who took me to the Cicero Public Library when I was little and bought me a hotdog on the way back.
Playing flag football outside of Nashville on a cold morning with his friends.
Talking to – that is, trying to talk to – our grandmother in Frankfurt. Bernie speaking in broken German and I, at the time unable to string two German words togethers, struggling to translate.
Sitting on the shore of Kentucky Lake, supposedly fishing but mostly talking up a storm.
Driving to see the hot springs near Casper, taking in the rugged beauty of Wyoming.
Or spending a day delivering portable toilets to ranchers who were hoping to cash in on the 2017 eclipse.
And the stories he could tell. What it was like on St. Croix after the hurricane. Tracking down witnesses in shady bars in the Missouri Bootheel. The colorful characters he met.
He told me how, as a very young man, he tried flirting with a very attractive and well-known radical activist. And how she shut down his romantic advances by giving him some communist book to read. The book, she said, had been “liberated” from a university library during an anti-war protest.
I thought the story was funny but likely embellished – until a few months ago, when he produced “Lenin as a Marxist,” a 64-page book written in 1925 by old Bolshevik. It had been last checked out from the library of the University of Wisconsin. It was due on May 7, 1970 – a day that coincided with campus protests there. Bernie kept the book for more than 50 years. I don’t think he ever read it.
When I went to Wyoming to visit him back in 2017, I wanted to see how he was doing. He had health and financial issues, true – but I also was heartened to see he had lots of friends up there.
We went to one of his favorite watering holes, and a young woman – a former waitress was there to show off her newborn – and when she saw Bernie, her face lit up. She gave him a hug and let him hold the baby.
It was like that with a lot of people. Bernie had a lot of friends, and he lost a lot too. But he kept finding new ones. And that speak volumes about him.
At the end of the day, and we all face an end to our days, we hope to live on in memories.
There will be records of our accomplishments, our job titles, our honors and awards. Whatever is left of our possessions will go to others.
But those things people will treasure most are the things that anyone can give – the acts of kindness that made other people feel truly appreciated and loved – unconditionally.
That’s what my brother did for me – and hopefully for all of you who knew him.
May he rest in peace. — From a service held on June 7, 2025, at Epiphany Catholic Church in Louisville, Kentucky.
Roland Klose 