Mom was in the midst of a major clear-out of the attic, amassing unwanted items for an upcoming neighborhood yard sale. When she gets it in mind to clean house, nothing is sacred. (Those sentimental heart-strings that spontaneously form around objects I haven’t looked upon in years? I must have gotten those from somewhere else.) Relics of our shared past piled up in her bedroom for the ultimate judgment: stay, or go.

My sister and I had first dibs. Mom walked me through the inventory: a half-strung acoustic guitar, crumpled homework assignments, faded needlepoint, piles of sheet music. I managed to turn all of this down- and then Mom pointed out a framed watercolor of a Boston street.

“Do you want this?” she asked. “Your Uncle Manoo painted it.”

My great uncle Manoocher, to be precise. He was my mom’s uncle, one of my grandmother’s three younger brothers, and had died a few years ago. I only met him once that I can remember, when I was six or seven years old. Considering there’s a large swath of my Persian family I’ve never met, that’s not bad.

During his visit, Uncle Manoo stayed at our house. I remember his bone-crunching hug and kisses- Persians are very affectionate- and the cigarette on his breath, probably the first time in my life I’d been exposed to it that closely. Mom scrambled to find something he could use as an ashtray. As far as I know, he’s the only person she ever allowed to smoke inside her house. Before his visit, I’d been told Uncle Manoo was an architect. For a brief period of time, I had wanted to be an architect too. I drew lots of pictures of houses from the front, using rulers to get the doors, windows, chimneys, and bricks- yes, I drew each individual brick- just right.

Later on, I’d found out Uncle Manoo had also known several languages, written poetry, and produced a few paintings- like the watercolor in my mom’s possession. She was fine with selling it if I didn’t want it, but I couldn’t imagine allowing such an artifact to leave the family. I took the painting home with me, and placed it in my office.

A few weeks later, my mom called excitedly to tell me about a book that had been published in Iran: a book about my great uncle.

As it turns out, Uncle Manoo is considered the father of modern Iranian architecture. He designed several modern buildings, taught at a collegiate level, and translated important architectural books written in other countries into Farsi. He treated his students like they were his own children, so much so that a group of them collaborated to produce a book about his life, work, and mentorship.

The book is only available in Iran. My last surviving great uncle was able to procure two copies, and sent one to my mom. I was able to flip through it the next time I visited her. It’s impressively huge, nearly two feet tall and several inches thick. My Farsi is poor to middling, but I could spot the innumerable mentions of my uncle’s name on the front cover and amid the pages. Given the lack of understanding, I focused more on the pictures: Uncle Manoo’s letters, poems, designs, and paintings, as well as photographs with family members and students.

One of the pictures, in particular, continues to amaze us. It’s a scanned photograph of the very painting I rescued from the neighborhood yard sale.