Duck Call Room - Uncle Si Cries with a Friend During His Tragic Week

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

John-David’s world is turned upside down by the sudden loss of his beloved Uncle Joe, so Uncle Si, Martin, and Godwin show up in the most powerful ways—from covering John-David’s shifts at the tackle shop to sharing stories, hugs, prayers, and plenty of tears. Si reflects on how faith gives us hope beyond the grave, and the boys are inspired to live the kind of life that’s worth celebrating on both sides of eternity. - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oh, are you sticking with? Oh, okay. Oh, you're absolutely in by. I was waiting on your walk out. Hi. All right, we good? We're back. All right, welcome back to the duck call room, ladies and gentlemen.

There's a noisemaker in the building. There's a noise maker here. Goblin's here on a Monday. He's not fishing. All the things, right? Yeah. Yet. And it's going to be a little different of a show.

One, because our friend, Hunter's not here. Oh, but we do have Madison straight from the unashamed, uh, unashamed podcast.

So we've promised her to laugh, which she doesn't get to do much over there of. Um, and she said, yeah, I'll stick around with y'all. So there you go. So Madison,

enjoy yourself. We hope you laugh. Hopefully you're not as tough of a crowd as John David's wife. Um, but she laughed this week. She did laugh. We can confirm. It took a roller coaster of oceans to get her to laugh.

You don't laugh. We can confirm that Allison Owen now thinks comedy is funny. She thinks comedy's funny, people. So I sat right beside her at John Christ, our friend, our close personal friend, as we call it. What's personal friend now? That's what we tell our wives anyway. Been on his bus. Yeah, we really are official now.

We've been on the bus. We text. Helped him make a bet that he lost. Yeah. Bonified. Yeah. There you go. Bornified friends now.

So we did go see him. And if I do recommend, not because he's our friend. And if you get the opportunity to go see, I haven't been, I've never been to a stand-up show. I guess I've seen stand-up, but it's never been like, hey, we're going to go watch three different dudes talk for two hours and try and make us laugh. I've never done that. Yeah. And all three succeeded. Well, I've never been to a stand-up show outside the comfort of my home, right?

I mean, I've watched the stand-up specials on Netflix. They've never been on a cruise? Huh? They got them on cruises on. We were the entertainment on the cruise. as soon as our bit was over we ran back to our room we didn't stand up we walked from one end to the other that's right they like to kill me going from one end the ship to the other and just frequent time yeah 10 out of 10

don't recommend being the main attraction on a cruise ship yeah not going to that's what i'm not going to do why they've got them things set on one end and the other end i'll never know yeah yeah it is where they got a balance it out or it'll roll over is that what it is weight and balance. That sounds good to me. Too much weight on one end. Oh, God. You ain't never thought of it like that, have you?

That would be terrible. I don't know. You wouldn't think them things get slashed around in the water either. They do. They move. They move a little bit. You find out when you get back to land. Just how much they were moving.

You go take that first shower after a cruise and you about fall down or at least I did. Like, that was wild. But no, we had a good time at the John Chris show. He was. and he was a great host as always for us. Highlight of my week. Yeah, if y'all get a chance, go check him out. So that's all I can recommend.

Well, any job that deals with the public is hard. Okay, and look, if you're trying to make a bunch of people laugh. I don't have a hard job. That's hard. Hey, well, yeah. But I will say, I notice one caveat, the people that laugh the hardest spent the most time at the bar. So I did notice the that.

I didn't laugh that hard. No, you weren't there. You weren't there but once. I'll tell you what you don't laugh is when they tell you the price for a bottle of water at one of them things. You think eggs are high. I never would have thought I'd pay for water ever. But here we are. Yeah, here we are.

That's where we're at. We all pay for water, boys. I remember drinking it out of water hose outside. Thinking you was living. now they say that'll kill you but you're still here what happened what changed

bottles yeah you still here now you can't drink them out of plastic bottles anymore yeah that's killing you yeah now half our brains plastic if you watch Instagram microscopic plastic I drink West Monroe water

bottled water whatever water yeah I don't know what's worse for you micropastics are round up I mean but I assume I assume we're drinking both of them at some point. You know what I've learned this week? You ain't got no control of nothing anyway. It's just drink whatever water you can find.

There you go. That's what I do. My question of that is a microplastic. Uh-huh. You can't see it. But it gets to your brain. And what does it do there? I don't know.

I don't think they know either. I don't know. It's a good way for a bunch of women to sell books on Instagram, ma. Oh, Lord. It's a hard shell around your brain protects it. We better not say nothing. They may buy ad on us one day. I think it looks like you can help out.

I know. Let no water get to it. Man. That's right. Hey. Well, I don't know. Let's rip the Band-Aid off. Let's rip it off.

It has been an interesting week. Yeah. You say it. Me say it? Okay, I'll say it. I'm going to cry here in a second. Yeah, so that's fine. Unexpectedly, and by the way,

Thanks for being here with us. Johnny D. Johnny D. Lost one of his uncles this week at the ripe young age of 61. And I've noticed, I've come to find out when your number of your age starts with a four,

all of a sudden those that start with a six don't seem that far away. You know, used to you'd hear 60, in my mind, like, and you're like, man, well, they had a pretty good life. But now, now I'm not that far away. So I'm like, no, that's pretty young, man.

Like, that's what, where are you at? 62. 62, so you're older than Uncle Joe. Yeah, you're older than Uncle Joe. But I will say, and we can talk about whatever we want to talk about. We'll break it down. Well, we're going to break it down. I feel, yeah, go.

His service, his service Friday, his memorial service was hands down a goal of mine now, was to have a service like Uncle Joe had. A bunch of people there, not only, bunch of people, but a bunch of positive people, and they celebrated this man. Like, were there tears? Absolutely. But it was a celebration of life, man, which is really cool to know that you could get that many people together in one place on a Friday afternoon and why there's sadness

and grief and all the things all around. We all got together and we celebrated a man. Was there a lot of stories about him? well sire we mainly oh man this is going to be tough but so my uncle joe is like the weirdest connections to uncle sigh in the whole wide world to i was trying to figure out how to describe them and then i was like i'm going to have to sit here by uncle sigh and they actually share a lot of weird similarities he's just normal um but he worshipped like you'd never seen somebody worship that can't sing unless you've seen Uncle Si.

Yeah. He was loud. He would move. He'd stand up. He was a front row guy. One arm up in the air all the time. So any, I don't care what church it was. He was going somewhere. And he was on the front, maybe the second row.

And he was about 6'5, hand up in the air. Like I didn't, I don't like sit on the front row because I feel like I'm too tall. And he was taller than me. And he'd just, boom. And he'd sing at the top of his lungs. And so that's what we did. We called some pastors up and said, this is what he would want to do.

We had a choir. We've got a lot of, me and him had a lot of similarity. Yeah, I got some good ideas for years off of Uncle Joe. You'd love it. I think you want the same thing. Well, I've went to one, like, you know, one of my aunts, you know,

and she was a hoot now, I'm telling you, or Aunt Marysitt. When she died, You know, everybody around there told stories. But that was the best going away of a loved one that I've ever been to. Okay. It's because, like you said, they celebrated who she was. Yeah.

And that's what they, I think they did a great job of, man. We did Friday? Yeah, Friday. Yeah. My week, I mean, I literally, so Uncle Joe was coming to work for us. Well, I apologize because I didn't know. No, he did, man. I had said something to you.

I know. Hey, you were the only thing missing there from having a full Duckman one reunion. Yeah, Uncle Max showed up the town. Mac was there. Mac, which, by the way, we all know Mac's incredible. Mac Owen is just the gym of a human, period. But to do the service of your younger brother and do it that well, unbelievable. Mac did, I couldn't have done it.

I don't have a younger brother, but I couldn't even do what he did for my older. I'll figure like, because they asked me in the military, would I, would I want to be in, you know, in the burials of, you know, veterans? Yeah. And I said, no, I, I can't do it because I'm afraid I'd embarrass the family. Yeah. I'm too emotional. Well, Mack probably embarrassed a couple of his, but that's okay because he is.

Well, hey. Like, he told some, he told some funny stories about, about how they all used to get along and all the things. Or not get along. Or not get along. And, you know, how, how Joe was the question. quiet one. Yeah, Joe was a quiet one. He ran a grocery store. It was the greatest hire I've ever made that is now not going to happen. He was retiring and I wasn't going to be able to pay him anything because of whatever the government rules are on retirement and all that. And I was like, yeah,

just come work part time. He goes, well, I'm used to six to six. And I was like, I'm going to get to retire off this guy. It's going to be unbelievable. But no, man, it's just like this whole week, you know. All right. Look, springtime is here. It's warming up. You know what that means? That means more outside cook. And y'all know, we love to eat beef around here. And that's what, because of our friends over at Triedells beef, makes such a good product, baby. Ain't it good? It's so good. Our friend, Sao Robertson would say, buy on the grill. Look, before we got Triedells, getting ready for a cookout, man, somebody had to run the grocery store, do all the things, grab whatever was left in case you were late in the day.

And you never really know where that beef come from. But with Triedale's beef, we skip. We the grocery store and do it a different way. Triedails comes from a family ranch out in Texas. They're a fifth generation American ranch, so they've been at it for a while. Now, look, the beef comes straight from their ranch and other ranchers they work with who raise cattle the same way. Their steaks are properly aged and shipped straight from the ranch to your door. We threw a couple of ribbys on the grill. Look, salt, pepper, garlic, hot fire, that's all you need. Look, because I'll tell you what, when the beef comes from people who raise cattle for a living, you can taste the difference.

The tenderness and the flavor are fantastic. So if you're stocking the freezer for grilling season, go check out Triedails Beef. I know in size case, Christine loves it, which is just a, she doesn't eat meat. She isn't a big meat easier, folks. Yeah. Just go to trybeef.com slash.

That's trybeef.com slash support ranch families and eat some dang good steak. The other part that I'm so proud of, Oh, we don't get through it. Me and Uncle Cy going to get through it. Everybody called him Uncle Joe at church. Yeah. And it's because they see people like you and him,

and they might not have that uncle. But he was my Uncle Joe, and other people looked at him as an uncle. And so it's just so cool. And it's so cool. I just hugged my UPS man like 20 minutes ago. Like he walked in, delivered some Yeti Cubs. Well, he may have needed it.

No, and he walked around the counter and said, man, I've been praying for you and just hugged me. And like there have been people coming to the honey hole and say, can we pray for you and pray over my dad? Because, you know, Tuesday I wasn't expecting to like, I left the honey hole took off. Dad's there. I'm running through a yard and I look up and there's five preachers. I said, this ain't good. Yeah. How they get to memo this fast.

And it's just, you know, you go through a lot of emotions. and, you know, one thing I definitely wanted to do today, because we've sat on here and said change of address, boys, and that's true. But sometimes I've said that, and I don't remember how bad this sucks. Like, this just sucks. There's no other way around it. He was a dear uncle of mine, definitely top five. I only have four plus.

But he's just one of my favorite human beings on the planet, and all the guys at our church called him Uncle Joe, and he was coming to work for me and then just you feel the rug just taken out from underneath you. Yeah. And you're just like, what the heck just happened? Because a lot of deaths. And I've been trying to, I mean, your boy had been wrestling.

I've been trying to make sense of all of it. Because then you think back to like when my granddaddy died. And I was ready for that. Like we all, we had time leading up to it. This was what the heck just happened. The man was going to weed eating his boxers and fell over. Yeah. You know what I'm saying?

And so it's just like, I've been going through it. And I guess the best part of going through it is you see the people that are there for you. You know, Martin cannot work a cash register very well at the honey hole, but he sure as heck did. Well, that's because y'all, for some reason, y'all got a decimal point on a cash register. And everything y'all got there is $4.99. But if you push that decimal point, it shuts a whole dagum register down. It does. It's not a good thing.

And then it starts yelling at you. And then Big Dave's over looking at me while he's putting on line on a reel. And I'm like, I need some help. He said, hit clear. I was like, I don't, where it's clear? But I got a picture of that. But they've used the clear button so much that that clear ain't on there anymore. Yeah, it doesn't rub it at all.

He's like right there in the middle. It's just a button. But yeah, and that's, and that's the kind of stuff that's like. Oh yeah, I worked part-time at the honeyhole last week for two days, man. That's fun. It was fun for me. But I mean, when the crap just sucks, there's no other way to say it, and you got to have like,

I had to go home and tell my kids. Yeah. That's why most people are going religious. While most people ask, well, you know, what do I need to do, you know, and Phil gave them the best advice I've ever heard. You know, I had to do something big. Yeah. Your uncle touched thousands.

Yeah, by baking cookies and pies. Just by being, just by being who he was. And he did it at a grocery. He ran the grocery store in town. Which, by the way, on that note, kudos to the fine folks at Brookshire Grocery Company, because let me tell you something, is how much this man meant. This is a corporate world, right? Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Bottom line. He worked at a place in West Monroe, Louisiana. This store is based out of Texas, which ain't that far away. But they knew Joe Owen and the owners of Brookshire's grocery company, Brad Brookshire, I talked to him in the memorial line. We sat there and I thought because God would introduce me to him way back when. And I was kind of thinking myself, man, that'd be cool.

Brad and them showed up. But you never know, man. How many stores they got? Too many. 602 was the one man Uncle Joe worked as well. I don't know how that works, but. They got a lot of them. And, you know, you just think, well, in life and in business and things,

getting away schedules don't work. But them folks jumped on a plane from Tyler, Texas and flew over here to pay their respect. to an employee. Let's just call it what it is. He was, he was an employee for Brookshire. He didn't have, he was store director, which is a big deal in all of that. But at the end of the day, he's still just an employee of the company. But to make that kind of impact where the folks at Brookshire's grocery company jump on a plane,

I don't know how them two stores are running because every other person in there either had a Brookshers or Super One shirt on, too. So like the whole stores from there and all through, they all showed up. And it was, I mean, that's the kind of legacy you want to leave, right? Like, that's the kind of stuff you want people talking about you for. That's the kind of, again, I wouldn't expect them to see Brad Brookshire of all people there. And it's weird that I know him anyway. So like, you know, it just is one of those kind of deal.

And man, it was just cool, man, your uncle. There you go. There's, I got a picture from our security. So I was about to break down and size me. But I had to go home and tell my kids something terrible had happened. Yeah, this is why that was going on. Martin is literally just trying to ring. He don't know what buttons he's pressing.

But it's a family business. I could work. I just tried. Well, the problem is there's. When a family business goes, like the family's got to deal with family stuff. Like, we're looking around like, uh-oh. And we have two people that, you know, James and Boo, I've cried with them already and I can't thank them enough for everything they've done in the past week.

Which Boo going through her own schedule of things too. So like, that's why I was like, you know what? work at a place that's got a pretty lax schedule. So Martin just showed up. I just showed up, sat down, I did my job here, there from my phone, and I did what I could for them to not screw anything up too bad. And at one point, the math works out. The math was correct.

I just had some weird way to get there on the buttons, but, you know, it was. At one point, I was just sitting there and me and dad were the only people in there, and all a sudden some old boy walks in and comes up behind my dad and hugs them and says, where's your eye hole jigs? Yeah. and just hugs him. Oh, Johnny Guy. That would be Johnny Galway.

Johnny Gal. I missed Godwin. Man. You weren't working that day, Mark. Yeah, well, I took Friday off because I figured y'all had enough other stuff to do, and I needed to be in here for a hot minute. You just talked about a change of address.

I just had the weirdest thought. Hit us with it, because I'm open. How would you like to be in heaven when Jesus walked up to Uncle Joe and says, hey, let me show you to your room. Yeah. Right this way. Yeah. It's been reserved for you.

Uncle Joe skipped that room and said, Where's the chorus? I'm front row. I need to be there. He probably went in there and put his bag down and said, all right. Where to worship? Yeah. We're, you know.

But yeah, that's going to be cool, man. And that's the cool thing about faith is we get to go see them again. How do people, this has been the toughest. It might be the toughest week of my life. Boy, I'm realizing that right now. To this point. And I'm saying a lot because with young Carter, you had a. But we came out kind of ahead in that one.

Yeah. Can't talk about Carter. That one's off limits for now. But I'm just saying. But I'm just saying comparatively speaking, when you make a statement like that, the people know at home, your firstborn got shipped off to a completely different city and you had to go. So to say that this could be the toughest week of your life.

That's just a shock. And I think it's. And I think there's people listening. We had so much plans. Yeah. We had so many. Like, Beth doesn't have her microphone. But every time she's tried to schedule me,

I've told her, Get me to June. Uncle Joe's going to be here June 9. June. She knows. She's smiling over there. Like, that was the mantra for John David for the past six months. And it was something I was just so.

Get me to June. And it wasn't even for work. It was like, man, I'm a, me and Uncle Joe worked together 15 years ago. And I was going to get to do it again. But this time it was going to be like, no pressure. Like, I was the boss. I ain't going to fire. Like, we were just going to hang out and have fun and do a good job.

And he wasn't going to yell at you for juggling oranges. Yeah, well, he didn't know about that. sorry he knew he knew that's one thing i figured out about that man he knew i will say this though of all the people that we used to work with at super one i saw my old boss from the produce department mr rick and he was there he he showed up at the house the day it happened and checked on me we hadn't hugged when we worked together we hugged that day and then uh well i ain't ever hugged jo dady but i hugged him about five times last week so that was wild i was kind of i was kind of sick of that visitation thing because those suck.

You just, hey, yeah, good to me, yeah, okay. And so I was like, I kind of would spot my people and I'd just go to them and like, I'm going to get this one over with. And I spotted one of my guys from Men's Retreat who, man, Uncle Joe just did so much for that on the cook team and everybody called him Uncle Joe. But I was going to hug him and then from behind I hear John Paul and Miss Sherry, the deli manager at Super One, who loves me and loves Uncle Joe. And she refuses to call me by my right name.

I corrected her a thousand times. She sounds like Phil Robertson. She goes, John Paul. She said, and I just looked at her. I said, well, sure. And I just fell into that woman's arms and hugged her and wept with her. But, you know, it's crazy to think about the people you work with and customers you have and the UPS guy giving you hugs. But if you live a quiet life and you just serve people.

do what's right and if you sit on the front row at church it probably helps too but you know people recognize that faith and it has been the toughest week of my life I'm gonna go out on them and say that

I've had to call friends over and say I ain't good me and Mark thank God for John Chris whatever I don't even know I spell your last name now John sorry right there on your shirt there you go

see all right I was like lose the age I had to get away and go last And now, like, somebody sent me a message like, you don't understand, like, when y'all get in there what that does for people just making them laugh. And I'm like, okay, now I do. Because that was, I needed that Saturday night.

But if you, if you don't have any hope. How do you wake up in the morning? First time that we had a make of wish he had come up here. So if you have never went through that. You know, either you got a good relationship with your family, I should say a close relationship with your family, and a close relationship with God Almighty and His Son and the Holy Spirit. If you don't have them too,

what do you do when something hits you like this? Yeah. Who do you turn to? I don't get it. And what is life if the grave is the end? Yeah. Why are we in a rush to get to a hole in the grave? Yeah.

I know, well, that's why I always tell because when me and my mother, okay, I'm a baby boy, okay. Mama's boy. Mama's boy. Praise. Okay. And proud of it. Yeah. I used to ask me, what are you going to do when she dies?

Oh, that's going to be a tough one for your boy here. Well, don't know. Well, see, I thought it was going to be to me. Yeah. But no, because of what faith I have and who I have it in. Yeah. I said, well, guys, here's something that I live. live with and I believe it wholeheartedly.

I know where she went. Yep. I know who she's with. And I know that she's surrounded by people that love her. And we get there. We get to go there. And hey, here's the best line.

And I will see her again. Amen, buddy. And that's, and I guess, that's what I want to tell you about Uncle Joe. Oh, yeah. There ain't no. Joe is home where we want to be 100%.

Oh, yeah. He wouldn't come back. Yeah. Because there's a lot of people was looking, okay, that was recorded in the Bible. Let me go back to them. And God said, no,

I've already sent them the prophets. Yeah. I've already sent messengers. Yeah. It wouldn't help them. It wouldn't help them. If you went back, it wouldn't help them. No.

They're going to have to put their faith in something. He said, if a man come back from the dead, they wouldn't believe it. Nope. And I hadn't done that. And he did it. But that was, and hey,

the best part of that is, he did it. and he's told me, I will do it for you too. Yeah, I don't know. Uncle Joe right now is there, okay? He knows stuff that we can only think we know. Oh, yeah. Right now he's L-I-V-I-N.

Ain't that something? Yeah, oh, yeah. It's like he think he living while you hear, but no, he's living now. Oh, no. Like, got that fresh, got them fresh Chuck Taylor's on. He probably got a single cab again. Well, he's got.

You know? Yeah, but all three don't look as good as it was going to. The most important thing is he's got a glorified body just like our Lord and Savior. But, and I just, I want to, if you're listening, you're probably a Christian. But if you're not. Or you call yourself one anyway. If you're not, I just want to use this opportunity to invite you in, like I'm going to laugh today. I'm also going to cry.

But I also am going to drive past, I'm going to have to have a talk with Aunt Sherry. about the plot we picked out because man it is on my way to work every day. And I got to look over there and see it. And I've turned in and went every day so far. But. Hey, there's a reason. There's a reason I ain't been. I got to go full PR real fast.

I might be wrong, but I doubt it. And even if I am, I'll never know it. Yeah, but he is. So I'm going to live just like Uncle Joe lived. And one day I'm either not going to know nothing and be gone like dust in the wind or I'm going to forever with my uncle and my dad and uncle sigh and Phil Robertson and Willie Robertson and Martin and Godwin and we're all going to be up there together and whenever you hear the verse oh death there is no sting or whatever I was like that why is this verse a thing because

I'm stinging it's because it hasn't happened yet yeah but one day that's going to happen and I want you there with me yeah there was no sting you're listening there was no sting for him the sting is for us. The sting's there now, but it's not going to be there one day. So if you're listening, come on in, boys. I was saying,

Jason preached yesterday and right at the end of when he said, gave the invitation, I stood up, my office before I was walking out. I said, hey, he's telling you,

come to Jesus, boys. Yeah. It's that time. I bet you said it a little louder. Oh, I did. Yeah, Jason, hey, thanks a lot of it.

He just walked me in a water because I, y'all, because people don't understand. The invitation, okay, that's Jesus Christ talking to you. Yeah. They sing a song and I love it. I know your name. Jesus knows your name.

Yeah. And hey, when you hear somebody speaking about him, when they offer the invitation, it's Jesus kind to call you home. Amen. Okay. That's what it is, man. You don't know when it's going to be.

Hey, look, hey. life is short. You're not promised the next second, okay? Yeah. Yeah. Hey, and like, just so we're all clear, Uncle Joe walked probably 50,000 steps a day in that grocery store. He ran a marathon a few years ago.

Oh, look great, man. Heart problems were not on the docket. Yeah, not what you'd expect. I think in the last couple of weeks he'd said he'd been feeling some weird stuff and he was in line to get that checked out. Didn't happen. I ain't going to, in the words of my amazing little cousin, Lauren, who is a pharmacist like I ain't going down that road.

No. Ain't no point. We know where he's at. Also, if you're in northwest Arkansas and you run into a single girl named Lauren, you got to go through me now. Because she's a baller. And the way her and her mom and Mack Aaron have handled this. Oh, you're your cousins.

She got up and spoke. Straight up. And I knew we were going to have to do an episode about this. It felt like I wanted to. But I was kind of like, maybe, maybe not. And then she got up and said, well, I knew anything. died i had to stand up here and tell y'all what he'd say and i was like oh shoot now i got to yeah that was a toughie you're right it was a good one now it was she she did a fantastic job she is the smartest

she's the smartest one we got so yeah she's the smartest one of all that makes sense yeah she uh that checks too you know but the uh no the whole family man it was just it was great like it was it was fantastic again sign me up for that that's how i hope that should be a goal for how to live your is that at the end of it, that's what they do. Right? Like that, again, I got some good notes for Christine if side goes first. Well, you're talking about. And if not, then that means we're in charge anyway.

Oh, man, we're going to have fun. You hear me? We about to have some fun, big. Give me the set left. I don't know if I'll put it on my headstone, but I always think about this. Don't stand here and weep for me over my grave. No, we're going to sing.

I ain't there. No, we're going to sing. Yeah, I ain't there. Yeah. Okay. No, we're going to have a good time. Let's have a party because guess what? I'm home.

You may want to give us a song list in case you don't want us to edit it or pick it their own if you want, if you got some, if you, we'll probably hit it as well with my soul for you because I've heard you sing that one for, I've heard you get loud on that one when they get that boom. Well, they hit how great thou art on Sunday morning at church. I said, boys, I'm about that. Oh, yeah, that was good. I almost went.

Yeah, I got there again yesterday morning. Yeah, it was rough. Yeah, it was crazy. I sang through the tears. There you go. But no, it was, it's a goal, man. It's a goal for how to live your life to be known as uncle or whatever that is, right? Like, whether it's uncle or crazy or, you know, like, whatever that you're known by that

and not by your full legal name. Like, that's the cool part. Oh, he's Uncle Joe and a lot of dude's phones. Yeah. Yeah, man. So, again, gives you something to aspire for. Like, you're looking at that. Like, that's what I want.

I want to be like him, man. That's a, you want to live a life like that. Yeah, if you leave this earth, okay, and then people, you know,

have, you know, if they must say anything, it's got to be good. Yeah. And Uncle Joe was one that had the reputation. It was all good.

Yeah. Not to mention, he was Willie Robertson's landlord when Willie lived in a shed behind his house for a couple years. Yeah. Which is the funniest. Well,

and that's what they said. I told Willie, I said, I, we'd eat in your old shed. Yeah, and he wrote, I mean, that's what they said, one of them weird facts. Like, he wrote the note for Willie to call Corey for their first date. He wrote the note and put it on the fall. Corey Howard called, call her back.

Yeah, Uncle Joe was part of that. Uncle Joe. This town's small, y'all. Yeah, well, you know, which is, I mean, it's wild to think about. Like, you just look back at all the lives touched. And, I mean, as much as I've been in Super 1 and seen him around there, and you can't miss him on the front row. You can't miss him at church.

You're going to see him. You couldn't miss him down there on the front row. But you know what? We missed him yesterday. Yeah, I was on the front row with my aunt and cousins. Yesterday? Yeah, as well. There you go.

How was that? I ain't going down there. We ain't going to. We all looked at each other and cried. We got a cry room at the Honeyhole now. She's called the office. I said, it's like a church. I said, if you close the door,

just cry your eyes out watch that monitor if we get too busy come back out it's just like a church now it can be yeah if we're two or three or together together and his name that's a good point he's there yeah oh then we got through friday and i was like all right i think i'm good got through the funeral and i texted mark on saturday morning i walk in the honeyhole and some dudes just got my dad praying for him and some other guy i don't know whose dad just died i'm like golly westman road just church all over the place y'all cousin mac aaron he's been handed some difficulties a lot like carter yeah um not going to go fully down that road but joe helped out a lot of dads like me and mac aaron uh he looked at my dad mac aaron's uh 24 works for my brother-in-law now uh selling honeyhole shirts and stuff but macs

if you if you buy honeyhole shirt online mac aaron send him to you um but mac aaron looked at my dad and goes did i miss something my dad my dad goes what he goes he goes my dad had this big of an impact on the community and we're like yay did buddy and it was just something you know when you're around it every day and there's just a leader around you and you're used to it it you don't realize it kind of like your dad and then you know when everybody finally stops and says oh wow I need to thank this guy and unfortunately it's because he's not here anymore yeah yeah you you really start showing some honor and and so also don't wait on that you know I passed Uncle Joe three days before he passed on the road.

He was walking his dog. I just waved. I wish I'd have stopped. But I ain't looking back on all that. You can't live there, man. We could all live there and we'd all be miserable. I did almost run over that dog, though. It was close.

Yeah, you can't live up in there. But it's just like we took the boys out to, they had this weird herpetology show here in town. A couple of weeks ago where they had snakes. I should have taken sight. I'll fix it. What's herpetology? Snakes, turtles, frogs, all the thing.

Well, they were, I took the boys there because I'm trying to get into education part of it. Run. Well, no, like, we can. Scream and get it. Now, you don't know. We can touch these. I'm talking about the turtles. Yeah.

We can touch these, but for now, until you all get older, we don't touch these. These are off limits. Yeah, these are off limits. Until we can identify the snake, these are off limits. So that's what I was trying to walk around and do. But anyway, while I was there. Oh, boy, walked up to him. me say hey man how's your dad been and of course i'm thinking you know in our world right uh people

think phil robertson's my dad and with everything that's happening i was just like oh man you know he's he's he's he's fine he's doing you know he's he getting along just fine he's like and he said well you're martin right and i was like well yeah he said well i ain't seen you daddy since we worked at the paper mill together i said oh well he's never been better man and my dad been gone almost five years now, you know, but I mean, truthfully, he ain't ever been better. Like, he, hey, he's living it up, man. I don't know what he's doing. He welding something up there. He got put on the construction team for adding more rooms every time somebody get in. If I know him, I mean, he was a plumber and pipe fitter, so he's putting in golden toilets and, you know,

holy toilet. You know, I mean, he just, I tell you what he ain't do. I know my dad, he ain't sitting around. Nope. He's doing something. He's doing something. He's playing in the grass. He's catching the armadillos he's doing whatever you know i told you but he scared me to death yeah uh-huh he's gonna be doing something so you know it's uh no man but you get in those kinds of deals and you realize it is wild what people say to you oh yeah it is a different animal that i hadn't been a part of like you know my papa my mom my granddaddy they've all gone to be with the lord but it was you know you saw it coming we're good yeah you saw it coming this one was a new feeling. Yeah, the shocks are weird, man. And we, we went through it, but then, you know,

if you, you know what, time for advice from somebody going through some stuff. If you don't know what to say, say, I don't know what to say, but I love you. And that's all you got to say. Oh, no, that's what I told a buddy man. Yeah. There are, and some of that stuff, there are no words, right? My best friend said. Just showing up, just being that. That's what's important, because my best friend was there and that poor boy is so awkward anyway. Oh, Drew? Oh, yeah. You was right, though.

He had gained some weight. Yeah. Marriage will do that. Zing! Might as well bury Drew while we're at now. Just make fun of him. But Drew walked up to me and I was like, this is going to be funny because best friend since junior high, but, you know, it's hard.

Dudes have trouble communicate. And he goes, hey man. Good seeing you. And I just started laughing. Yeah, whatever. Hey, man. I got nothing. That's why I didn't say nothing.

I walked in the honey hole said, well, y'all need done, man. Yeah. What can I do? So many people, man, and so many fun stories. Oh, yeah. Well, somebody said, I don't remember, was it Mac or was it Tom?

Somebody said it there said grief is the price you pay for love. Man, that's tight. That makes grief okay, right? Yeah. You know, if it didn't. Well, just think of somebody that never loved anybody. That's what I'm saying. Like, if you didn't.

It's better to have loved. I've never loved. Ain't that the truth. Praise God for that. Yeah. Yeah, if this was just a normal day, it would be a bummer because I'd be like, well, I had this uncle that I wish I was close to. Yeah.

Instead, I had this uncle that, like, I'm devastated about. I was going to work with. We were good friends. We did ministry together. Yeah. Oh, he was so good, too. When you had to run a whole retreat and you had like, oh, how are we going to feed these guys? I had one answer, Uncle Joe.

And they were like, what's he going to do? I was like, I don't care. He's in charge. I don't have to ask anymore. Don't worry about it. He'll work it out. He got this. Are you going to spend too much money?

No, he runs a grocery store. Yeah. Can he cook good? Yes, he used to run the bakery. Will dessert be okay? It'll be better than anything you've ever had. Yeah, the eggs may be a little overdone, but the dessert going to be popping. No, I'm just saying.

Hey, don't worry about the third course. It will be fine. Hey, you know what his best course was bacon. Bacon? He had to cook eggs and bacon for 200 dudes about three times a year, two days or like three weekends a year. cook breakfast. He figured out you can just deep-fried bacon. Yeah.

Oh, and just deep-fried bacon. It's like, what, you're baking grease, gonna deep-fry some more bacon? You never go wrong with bacon. Yeah, amen, buddy. I will say to all my men's retreat guys,

if you happen to listen to this, all the food I used to sneak, whoever's in charge now, I'm going to still need that. Yeah, I need that nephew rights to the food before everybody else. I still need that key to the kitchen. Yeah, I don't know how.

I lost that little tidbit. Yeah. Well, anyways. It's all good, man. It's going to be a, I was telling you, it's just a long and winding road now. Like, the important part you get through the service, you get past it, and now will be, I'm sure y'all can all speak to this. I know Gavin lost his dad.

Uncle Joe, while he may have been called an uncle, was a father figure to a lot of people. You're going to hit these weird deals where it just comes out of nowhere. and you're like, what in the heck just happened? And it's going to be in the weirdest time, in the weirdest place. And I just look at it as like the good Lord saying, I got you, big dog. Like, you know, like I got you, but most importantly, I got him. That's the most important.

Because I was going to say, okay, he called him home. Yeah. You may not know why, okay, because I, hey, like J.D. said, and I agree with you, the woman you're talking about, I think John Paul is a better name to John Dave. John Paul! I'm serious. I can't go back in that grocery store for maybe ever, but when I do, I'm going to hug.

Yeah, you're going to have to do online up there, man. You ain't going to be able to walk back in that joint. Oh, I can do it. But I say, I'll give you a perfect example. Like after Dad passed, it was right there in the middle of hunting season, all the things. And for some reason, one morning, Clay said, I'm just going to pick you up. And I'm like, well, what are you talking to pick me up? A, I always drive.

I don't ever want to be a captive audience for anybody. He did drive me to John Chris. That's what I'm saying. If you need a driver, I'm your guy. Like, I am totally cool being the captain of the ship. But for some reason that night before, I was like, yeah, okay, whatever, that's fine. I would have never said it. Most times, like, I'll meet you there because you're going to be running late.

And I don't want to be riding with somebody going to go 95 miles an hour. Like, I don't want to be riding with a guy that can afford a speeding ticket. just not where I am in life. Like, you know, I like to drive like the guy that can't afford the speeding ticket. So I just, I kind of cruise, you know. But anyway, I'm standing there in my driveway. Shocker, he is late, right? Oh, yeah.

And like, I'm just standing there, you know, 4 o'clock in morning, whatever. And I did look up for some reason and there's like seven or eight shooting stars all at one time. It's like, and I'm like, well, dang, I guess old man's up there welding. Like, you know, but I didn't ever have no. Like, I wasn't supposed to be outside. Any other day, I'd have been driving. I would have been, you know, I'd have just been going duck out. And I'd have never seen those if I wasn't sitting there waiting on Clay to get to my house.

And that's one in moments where I'm like, I'm telling you, man, it just comes out of nowhere, man. But it's so cool because you just, you see them in everything, man. And it's like, it's cool because we get to see them again. That's the coolest part. And there's. And we get the party for eternity. And again, like you said, if we're wrong, okay. Yeah.

You know, you, man. It's the same fate either way. But I would feel on that. Yeah. I might be wrong, but I seriously doubt it. I could be wrong, but I'm a Robertson. And I think our culture, especially us guys, which I don't fall into this because I'm a huge baby, you try to hold it together and you don't want to cry and you don't want to do this and that.

But then, you know. I mean, you got to let that stuff out. Yeah, but hey. But no, no, I'm not all out. That's fool. Well, exactly, because Jesus cried. That a man can't cry. Yeah.

That's poor. Godwin says it. Godwin said it the first time. And I know that I, he was the first one to say it that made me think about it that way. We were doing the deal somewhere speaking. I'm not going to, I'll let Godwin tell you. But he said, think of how cool heaven is. And why did you say that, Galvin?

You know why. Because. We've traveled everywhere. We've seen beautiful oceans and mountain ranges and waterfalls. And he just spoke that into existence. But he's going back to prepare a place. Can you imagine what that's going to look like? Yeah.

He spoke one into existence, but he's preparing the other. And I had never thought about it in that context until me and Gobin were doing a speech somewhere. and we've done a bunch of them tag team together and Gobbin was going to this first time we had done it tag team and it was the first time I'm standing there on that stage I'm supposed to be speaking and now my man 5-7 over here my little buddy. All right he's got my little chunky buddy has just

has just blown my mind where I'm like you're going to have to take the rest of this one because I got nothing because you just sent my mind into a place of now trying to imagine something that I know I can't because the book of Revelation says you can't like they start describing all the colors and all the things and this like no no that's why I want to want to

and just that's why I want to preach and the guy leaves me with this he's fixed to leave or she's going to leave and said well I'm because I just can't see it it's God you're always talking about and I said wait a minute I said remember the questions I asked you Where did all this beauty come from?

Yeah, how did it get here? The birds, all the different color birds, the fish, all the different color fish, all this stuff that you can see, you've got to ask yourself a couple simple questions. Where did it come from? All you got to do say thank you. Yeah. It's the one time and life that it's okay to receive. That's right.

Without giving. Like, you mean, you think about it because it's better to give than to receive. receive. Yeah. This one, you just got to receive it. I accept it. And then all you got to do is, okay, keep your eyes on him and keep trying. Yeah.

Keep trying. Get back up. Dust it up. Let's go. Get it on. That's something that Phil told me when he was sharing the gospel with me that I just, it just stuck with me. He said, you ever tried to be good?

Well, no, no, because, hey, look, when he met, now that you say it, Hey, when he come to Jesus, let me tell you. When he came to Jesus, he actually said that, just told it and said, hey, look, what do you mean? Be good. I've never been good. Tell me if you've heard this one before, dear and Uncle Joe service other day, there was this weird exclamation right there in the middle of it of a man. Kurt Lively showed up. Jesus.

Tom got Kurt fired up. Yeah. Oh, Kurt back there. I said, oh, he couldn't stand it. The tears stopped for a second. Oh, no, hey, you got to love that man. He couldn't stay. We may have to slide Kurt in here.

Oh, yeah. You're going to love that man. Because in the words of Kurt Lively, he's going to show us smelling like old spice and cat piss. That's why we ain't had him in here yet. He said, I said, Kurt, your truck kind of dented them trees out at Camp Chioca and got a lot of give, brother. Yeah. But yeah, right there in the middle of it, Kurt dropped a Jesus. Oh, I started laughing.

I said, there it is. And everybody in the group was Kurt Lively, man. And we stood in line with him too. Good break, Kurt. Appreciate that. Hey, I like times when I get to get in there. Brittany asked me, she said, do you know all these people too? I said, apparently we knew a lot of the same folks.

Hey, West Monroe, West Monroe's finest were there for sure. Yeah, yeah. I knew I shook a lot of hands in that line. It was also wrapped around the building, by the way. Well, that. If that tells you about the man, too. The line was legit wrapped around the building. kept walking. I was like, well, I'm going to get to the end of it here at some point.

No, eventually you just kind of slid in somewhere and that's where you ended up. That's an honor tribute to the man. Oh, I know that. That all these people come, okay, to say goodbye. Yeah. Well, to say goodbye to him, but to also let the family know they love them. Yeah. Which is a really, it's a really cool thing, man.

It's in the worst of times you find out what people are made of, right? And that's where you build the community. Nobody, when everything's going great, you rarely talk to anybody for the most part, right? That's why I always liked whenever we was having family reunions. All the cousins and everybody got together and then, you know, and sit, sit on you, get on your knees and sit down and listen to them. I'll tell the stories about, you know, about what went on, who, you know, what happened, you know, yeah. Yeah. It's out of this world.

Well, you want to... I know what it's going to be. It's going to be First Peter. Oh, you're not going to share the one he shared. First Thessalonian. I thought we were... Actually, you just won up to it. I was going to try and get to...

So while he's looking it up... Oh, shoot, Martin. Well, I didn't mean do this to you, but I just... I figured I knew what it was going to be. So here's a kind of guy. I'll let John D. look at this because I know that just reading it's going to be hard enough. Oh, shoot, Martin. And let me explain.

The Lord blocked that one out of my head so I wouldn't... cry right here. I'm just going to go straight to my Uncle Joe's Facebook and I'm going to go to the last thing. He shared a verse every morning on Facebook. So for people that say Facebook's a devil, it ain't a devil, whatever, you use stuff for what it's there for. But he shared a verse every morning and a couple of hours before he was called home. Hold on. He got tagged in a lot of stuff since then because we had to go make the news. We go get there and I'm going to lose it. Godly, so many people have tagged on May 6 at 548 in the morning. My uncle Joe, God on Facebook, about four hours before he went to be with Jesus.

And he said 2nd Peter 318, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and forever a. That's tight. That's tight, man. If that's the last thing you put out in public. that's tight man so also you're surrounded by glick huh witness and include jose so get some perseverance yeah you might even say he might knew he was on his way home you never know i mean we we don't know that's for sure but

he but i say this whether he knew he was on his way home or not he knew when that day came where he was going so which is awesome uncle joe the whole owing family we love you guys uh for any of you look that i know this happens every day right You may be dealing with this same thing in your family or you know somebody or whatever. Reach out to you, crew, man. Like, let people be there for you. They want to be there for you. Just know that you're not an inconvenience to them.

And, man, if you haven't had the chance to seek out Jesus and look him up, there ain't no better time than right now. And the best thing about it is, hey, if you find him, you'll never be alone again. Amen, buddy. All right. We'll see y'all next time right here in the duck call room. We're out.