My uncle David is the nicest guy I know. Mom says that’s because Grandma was depressed when he was little, and David could make her smile by acting cute and lovable, but all of that took place 50 years ago, and Mom’s always quick and loud about analyzing the behavior of those around her, so I haven’t necessarily adopted her view. What I know is that David loves to make people happy, apologizes for bad weather or traffic, and is the person to call when you need a favor.

I know David pretty well. He’s been around all my life. After my mom and dad divorced and Dad moved half a state away with his new wife, it was David who came to my games and took me mini-golfing and bought me the stuff I really wanted. I can’t remember ever calling him “uncle” – he’s always been “David” to me.

I’m not his only nephew. Mom’s two other brothers have supplied me with four cousins and David with a niece and another three nephews. But I always lived closest and spent the most time with him. He’s been more of a father to me than my own, and I guess I’m the closest he’s had to a child of his own.

I’ve stayed at his house a lot. I spent the whole summer here last year, and I’m angling to do it again in four months. As I’ve been telling him, the pond we built together needs work, and I need another break from Mom.

The pond is almost natural. There’s a small year-round creek that runs through David’s back yard, and we dredged a channel from it to the low spot near the side of the redwood deck. It was a challenge to make the thing water-tight because we opted for a plastic liner instead of the recommended concrete pour, but we managed to construct a container almost six feet in diameter, and we stocked it with half a dozen carp.

We didn’t know then how individual fish can be. We had no idea that the big fellow – presciently named Brutus by David – would outgrow all the others and be so dominant and hungry. We suspect he ate his co-residents; within two months he was the only fish in the water. I suggested we restock and watch Brutus more closely. David didn’t disagree but decided we’d wait till spring or even summer to try again.

So Brutus has had the pond to himself this winter. That fish just kept circling, growing fat on David’s fish food and whatever else he could find, and before the end of last month he had finned out so much mud that the connection to the creek clogged. David cleared it a few times – I helped during weekends when I stayed over – but a fish has to keep moving to breathe, and Brutus’s fin action kept clogging the connection.

I arrived last night for a long weekend. Even by the deck light I could see the fresh damage. The pond was measurably smaller.

And Brutus was bigger. As he grows his fin action gets stronger, and he stirs up the mud the pond has acquired since it was dug. The muck settles around the encroaching circumference; the more Brutus swims around the less room he has.

I was pondering the erosive situation when David called me inside for pizza, and I was about to bite into my first wedge of what we call “uncle pie” (pepperoni, sausage, bacon, and peanut butter) when he starting telling me about my cousin Jason.

He wasn’t talking out of school. David and I have no secrets about Jase.

The call had come the night before.

“Funny thing, Uncle D,” was Jase’s opening line. “Well, not exactly funny …”

Lani is pregnant. On the surface that’s not bad news: Jase and Lani are in their late 20s, married, apparently happy, within a family that loves them and loves babies. But Jase said they don’t want to bring kids into this sick world (Lani is a quiet one, new to the country and without friends or family here, so no one knows what she thinks), certainly not now when Lani is in school, probably not ever. They aim to terminate this pregnancy. Not only that, but they just found out that Lani is farther along than they thought. Jase said 16 weeks. (Isn’t a whole pregnancy like 40? Did they really let her get halfway there without doing anything?)

Yes. And now they learn that the San Diego clinic can’t handle an abortion at this stage. They have to come to Oakland for the procedure.

It turns out Jase was calling because he and Lani need a place to crash for a couple of nights. They were driving up today, but I’m using the spare room here. And the living room won’t work for them.

Funny? What’s funny? I’m all for reproductive rights, but I don’t think this is what Mom had in mind when she marched with Planned Parenthood.

David booked a motel room for them. He and his estranged spouse have like a million Starwood points and could get them a room with those. Idiot Jase thought they could drive up, have the procedure done, and then get back in the car for a 10-hour haul home. He even wondered if they could bring the dogs! “Like it’s a field trip,” commented David. He had a look of disapproval on his face that I’ve never witnessed.