A Girl’s Life

Few events stand out in my life that were life-changing in any significant way.  I guess that’s good.  One episode, which stretched on for years, taught me much.

A day of ice skating at the lagoon.  That’s how it all started, the end of life as I knew it.

The Exposition:  I was 11, my sister nine.  Mom took us to the lagoon at Robinson Crusoe Park to ice skate.  We had done it before, I think—it wasn’t often enough for the memory to imprint in any way, but this particular trip was burned into my mind indelibly.  We skated round and round, on that frigid Iowa day, along with 20 or 30 other skaters.  My scarf sat snugly around my neck, waving in the wind as I chugged along.  I tried not to fall on the uneven skating surface, my goofy long stocking cap perched high on my head.  My mom sat on the bench at the edge of the lagoon watching us.  Soon, she took a walk.  After a while, I followed along to see what had become of her.  She was standing by a large old oak tree, talking to a man.  She shooed me away and I went back and swirled around again on the ice, unsure of what I’d seen, but knowing it was not in the usual. 

We drove home later, the warm air from the car heater almost painful on my frozen feet even as it helped thaw them.  Arriving home to the steady safety of our little house, where warmth was found in every corner.

Building Action:  My father talking in, demanding the car keys.  My mother insisting he not leave with the only car.  My sister sitting rigidly in the corner of the couch, her arms moving instinctively over her head.  Me, with my legs pulled up to my chin in the brown recliner. 

Climax:  The keys suddenly became the prize, each of them vying with all of their might for control of the tiny, jagged piece of power, their grunts and groans unrecognizably animalistic and brutal.  The struggle became a dance of rage from one end of the house to the other—the curtains in the dining room came crashing down, chairs knocked over, lamps, trinkets, and baubles toppled.  I was barely aware of the cries—I don’t know when I realized they were not the cries of my sister, but my own.  The large floor to ceiling lamp with three large ceramic hanging shades of avocado, orange, and cream came crashing down over my chair, shattering into the million pieces of doomed relationship. The endless tinkling of ceramic got their attention.  Battle-weary, they stopped.  My father left.  It turned out to be for good this time.  Battle-scarred, we cried.

The Denouement:  A year later, the man at the oak tree became our stepfather.

Each week, it was dad’s turn to pick us up at mom’s house.  At first, he was diligent.  My sister would sit on the three-step stool in front of the window until she saw him and run excitedly out to the car.  Then, he became popular with the co-ed bar crowd–it was the free-love, swinging singles days of Hi Karate cologne and polyester.  She’d sit at the stool, looking longingly out the window and say to herself, “He’ll be the tenth car.  He’ll be the third brown car.  He’ll be the fifth brown car with a white top…”  Somewhere around, “He’ll be the tenth car,” I’d take off and go play with my friends—he wasn’t coming.  She never gave up hope he would.

On my 13^th birthday, he called, needing to share his woeful tale of having to pay $40 whole dollars in child support per month.  Insisting he had no gas for me to come see him on my birthday.  My mother drove us there.  He spent our brief time together blaming my mother for his lot in life—not realizing we could care less about whose fault it was.  No present for me.  We were in tears within minutes.  Mom turned around and came to get us.

My stepdad swooped in with his squad car that day and whisked us to the movies, lights flashing.  He gave us a pat and said he’d be there when we got done.  He was.  As he would be every day. 

I got home and found $5 in a card stuck in the mailbox simply signed, “Dad.”

Country Life

 

My mom and stepdad retired almost 20 years ago.  My stepdad was a cop who worked his way up from patrolman to Captain in charge of the entire patrol division.  He started the department’s first internal affairs division, worked in SWAT, and worked everywhere except the detective division.  He didn’t really like detectives.  He was twice wounded in the line of duty.  Both times were related to the race riots in the 1960s.  Mom was a commercial artist who saw the writing on the wall when computers took over the bulk of her job.  They were ready to give up the hustle and bustle of city life, traffic, and crowds for the country.  They searched and searched for the perfect place.  It took them a couple of years until they found the place for them.  It needed a lot of work—almost a year of renovation.  But, when it was done, it was spectacular.  I manage to get home every few years for no more than 3 days at a time.  The last visit was four hours.   I had business in Chicago.  I swung by for a “hello.”  I stepped out of the car and hugged everyone.  Mom handed me some coveralls and pointed at the tiller in the garden where I spent the next couple hours.  After that, she fed me lunch and I got back in the car and drove to Chicago.  They could toss up a sign out front and give it a name like “Walnut Grove B&B.”   It’s so far out and off the beaten path, they rarely get any visitors.  And, I think that suits them just fine.  But if you did visit, it would go something like this…

Picture the pastoral setting (this is it, actually) with beautiful rolling hills, cows with names, neighbors who live miles apart from one another yet still know unusually intimate details of each other’s lives, large old growth Walnut trees growing in a dense grove to provide shelter to the little Disney-like animated animals who live in the area.  Off in the valley, down the hill from the house is a large pond where half of nature congregates before dark to have a drink and chat a bit.  As you move toward the house at the top of the hill, you can see beautiful flower gardens and the four-square farmhouse built before the turn of the century.  Inside, it’s warm and inviting.  The food is fabulous.  You sleep in a comfortable bed with a down comforter of the highest quality to keep you warm.  In the distance, you can hear the coyotes howling as you drop off to sleep.  Ahhh, the country life…you’ve fallen in love.

But, then, it’s 4:30 a.m.  You sit bolt upright.  “What the hell is that noise?”  You leap up to shut the windows only to find they are already closed as the noise grows louder and louder.  Jet lag is not pretty, you need your sleep.  You slowly form your thoughts enough to peek out the window to see what the source of the endless din might be.   Hundreds of melodious freakin’ birds.  There they are—a cacophony of happy, hungry, little bastards all flocking in from all points in the county for breakfast at the window right below you. Tweet, tweet, freakin’ tweet.  I’ll take the freeway noise any day.

People have a tendency to see country life through rose-colored glasses.
~ PJ Harvey

Mystery Solved

Just got back from Berkeley. Got some beach time, plenty of rest (well, I was horizontal a lot), and had a fabulous meal at an Ethiopian restaurant that came highly rated by a special Irish lass I’m getting to know. I am still pinching myself–she is something else! I’m primed and ready for the work week. Meet you at the gym at 5:20 tomorrow morning. Hey, hey, need those Ask the Middle-Aged Lesbian questions! Don’t have any problems? Make one up! I hope eventually to take over for Cary Tennis at Salon.com, and I need the practice.

The mystery of the great grandmother’s house (read “Do Your Ears Hang Low” here) was solved. As background, my father e-mailed me with the address of great grandma’s place and Chris of Red Hog Diary, rode his Harley up there and shot some pics. Problem was, it wasn’t the right house. I never once questioned that Chris went to the place instructed…which pointed to my dad. Mom volunteered to go because she purportedly remembered the correct address, and solve the mystery to determine that I hadn’t, in fact, lost my mind (though we all know that’s tenuous, at best). Turns out she didn’t know the address either, but took a turn down a road in the general area and said, “this is the road.” Not bad for not having been there in 40 years. It’s pretty much as remembered, though, the lot’s been carved up and there is no fake brick shingle siding anymore. Obviously, the beautiful gardens aren’t there, but it’s damn sure still the po’ side of town.

This is the house. It looks like shit, is 100 years old, and should probably be dozed over. I doubt very much the people living there now have any clue about the woman who lived there over 60 years.

The advantage of a bad memory is that one enjoys several times the same good things for the first time. ~Friedrich Nietzsche

Mr. E & The Birthday Cake

My sister and I used to tool around the neighborhood, day in and day out, visiting neighbors, playing with our friends and doing anything to extend the daylight.  We lived the sweet life.

Our older neighbors never seemed to mind our visits and non-to-subtle pleas for homemade cookies. Our rounds were predictable, and usually met with sugary success. We’d sit at kitchen tables, gobbling up whatever was offered, and I’d soak up their stories and listen to their histories.  It was all part of my plan to be the next Harriet the Spy.

My favorite old neighbor was Mr. E.   Mr. E. was married to Mrs. E.  They seemed like such a loving couple.  Married like 50 years, retired from the university, and living in a quaint little house near the park, we’d spend lots of time at their house in the summer.  Mrs. E. would always have cookies and kool-aid for us when we stopped by.  She’d sit in the chair by the window and watch Mr. E., who was usually outside working in the flower garden.  We’d float from sitting on her footstool in front of her, to the gardens outside.  Tall and thin, Mr. E.’s white thick hair was combed straight back.  He wore Ben Franklin specs that sat securely on his large, hook nose.  His clothes consisted of olive work pants, belt, and olive shirt buttoned all the way to the neck.  Atop his head, he wore a safari-style gardening hat. 

Many days, we popped over to play with the ancient, antique toys that must have seen a lot of action back in the 40s, but sat in the basement, obviously quite unloved for years and years before we discovered the treasures.  One day, while he worked intently in his garden, I stopped by with my plastic ukulele.  Instead of being annoyed at me for interrupting his work, he sat down on the steps and started plucking out, “Shine on Harvest Moon.”   They never seemed to get tired of us, I don’t know why—I was constantly peppering them with questions.  It had to be annoying.

It struck me as odd, this particular day we popped over for our cookie fix, because there were cars parked on the street in front of the house.  Mr. E. never had company and his car was always carefully housed in his one-car garage.  Mr. E. answered the door and I could see that many people were somberly walking around the house or sitting in all the available chairs.

“Mrs. E. has gone to her reward, you’ll have to come back and play another time.”  He patted us on the head and slowly closed the door.  I’d never known anyone who’d gone to their reward.  I didn’t even know what it meant, really.  So, we went home and told our mom.  She explained, and I cried.

Things went on as before after Mrs. E. died.  Mr. E’s spinster sister from Chicago moved in with him and our visits now included her.  Not nearly as warm and cuddly as Mrs. E., she still allowed us to continue our quest for cookies and kool-aid unchecked.

Time came when my parents were separated. Mom had to go back to work.  Times got tougher.  Mom’s birthday was coming up and we wanted to spoil her.  So, first thing we did is tell her to bake a cake for us.  Like she didn’t know what it was for.  We also instructed her to provide some frosting.    We decorated the cake ever-so-carefully with anything we could find—shredded coconut, raisins, some Lucky Charms, and whole, in-the-shell hickory nuts from our trees outside.

We invited all our friends—all the old neighbors.  Mr. E., Miss E., Mrs. Brinkman, and Mrs. Price–there they all sat, up in our room—four old neighbors, scrunched around this teeny, tiny kids play table on itsy, bitsy chairs.  Mom got home and we lured her upstairs as they all got up and yelled, “Surprise!”  She feigned surprise at her beautifully decorated, but mostly inedible cake.

I look back wistfully at the kindness of those neighbors, who had a sense of what was going on at our house, and at the graciousness that my mother displayed during a turbulent time.  We felt so good for giving mom a special day and for having such wonderful neighbors and such a momentarily charmed life that did not at all foreshadow what was to come.

Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses. ~ Confucius

Lessons From The Farm: Never Name The Livestock

This month’s Vanity Fair had a very moving tribute by Buzz Bissinger to Barbaro, the 2006 Kentucky Derby winner who was tragically injured in the Preakness and eventually died.  All those involved in his story knew that you should “never fall in love with a horse.”  But, they did anyway.

My grandfather, who was a college professor, decided to buy a farm in the early 70s and farm part-time.  He raised some livestock and grew some crops.  We got to visit the farm and “help” with the chores.  It was quite an education.  We helped bale hay and rode with grandpa in the fields on his ancient tractor and tiller, helped feed the chickens and worked in the garden.  I loved all the animals. He warned us never to name the livestock.  Seemed pretty stupid to me.  How else could you identify them?

One visit, I found three cows out in the pasture.  I immediately named them, “Tic,” “Tac,” and “Toe.”  Each time I visited that year, I’d go out and sit on the fence and talk to the cows (let’s not discuss that aspect of my personality right now, huh?).  Until that fateful day when we arrived for a big Sunday meal and I leaped out of the car to run to the pasture.  I looked around – something wasn’t right. 

I ran into the farmhouse and said, “Grandma, where is Tac?”  She looked down at me, as she absent-mindedly pulled plates for dinner out of the cupboard and said, “Ask your grandfather. You need to wash up.”

I ran over to Grandpa.  “Grandpa,” I asked, “Where is Tac?”  He solemnly pointed down, to where the hamburgers, buns, and condiments sat in the middle of the table, and said, “He’s right there.”  And, then he walked away, as though what he said meant nothing—oblivious to the fact my eyes had rolled into the back of my head, heartbeat and respiration slowing into imperceptibility.  The room eventually stopped spinning and the psychedelic kaleidoscope of color in my brain eventually dissolved.

Until that point, I hadn’t understood that steers weren’t cows and absolutely believed to the core of my being that the packages of hamburger we bought in the grocery store just appeared magically.   But, it all came flooding in and, aha—so that’s why you never name livestock. 

I felt like Charlton Heston as he screeched, “It’s people, Soylent Green is peeeeoooppleeee.”   I skipped eating hamburger for a long time after that, but I never, ever named another farm animal. 

 

…is brought to you by Soylent red and Soylent yellow, high energy vegetable concentrates, and new, delicious, Soylent green. The miracle food of high-energy plankton gathered from the oceans of the world ~ From the movie, Soylent Green

Do Your Ears Hang Low?

In the little town of Vinton, Iowa, just down the road a spell from the big state mental hospital, and home to of the best popcorn fields in the world, there sat a little tarpaper shack, where the weeds grew unchecked between the cracks of the neglected tar and gravel street, down near the railroad tracks. 

The house sat right up against the street, with two lop-sided, rotting wooden stairs leading to the front door.  The yard was huge and full of all types of Iowa wildflowers and a large, meticulously tended vegetable garden. In the back was an old outhouse that eventually became the garden shed.  The entire house was probably 700 square feet.  The floors sloped and waved and jutted from 70 years of settling and warping.  The bare floor was sprinkled liberally with simple hand-made throw rugs to keep the chill of an Iowa winter at bay. 

The house had that aged, musty smell yet was invariably spotless.  Long-faded wallpaper with patterns out-of-date by the 1920s covered each wall.  The kitchen was the largest of the rooms and obviously the most used.  Under the simple kitchen table was a small rope with a knot in the end that served as the handle to lift up the cellar door, which led perilously down several rickety stairs to the tiny, pungent, dank, dark, dirt room where the year’s food supply, culled from the bountiful garden, were stored.  The living room was small—with a coal burning stove eventually replaced by an electric heating stove.  A short couch lined one wall, and directly in front of the couch; facing the same direction as the couch, sat the one comfortable chair in which a woman sat for much of her day watching the small black & white television at the other end of the room.  Hanging above the television, a small, lonely picture of Jesus looked down upon the room.

The woman, who lived to somewhere between 99 and 101 years old, depending on who you took as authority on such things, was tall and lean.  Her dress was always immaculately ironed.  Her hair was white as pure driven snow, and was always covered by a hairnet.  When she spoke, her voice warbled and rasped from too many years of use.  Age and gravity had some interesting repercussions.  Her face was very, very long, reminding me of a tired old Bloodhound with wrinkles on top of wrinkles.  Her earlobes had somehow managed to extend nearly to her shoulders, and her breasts, well, she was never one to bother with such frills as a bra…she was old, let’s leave it at that.  Whenever I saw her, a particular Girl Scout song would pop into my head, “Do your ears hang low, do they wobble to and fro, can you time them in a knot, can you tie them in a bow, can you throw them over your shoulder like a continental soldier, do your ears hang low?”

As a child, I paid little heed to her, and as my conversation wasn’t very interesting to her, we never made a connection.  I probably spoke a total of 10 words to her my entire life.  She visited freely with her son and grandson (my grandfather and father), but we were left to our own devices playing on most visits at the back of the house in the tiny closet-sized bedroom, with an ancient erector set and tinker toys.  All I really knew is she spent over 65 years a widow, raising her kids the hardscrabble way, but most of it was spent alone in that little house, taking care of her business. 

Our last visit came when I was about 20, on leave from Germany.  Her hearing was nearly shot and her eyesight failing.  My father pulled up a straight chair to be near her.  She sat in her chair, facing the same direction we faced sitting on the couch behind her—which was always so odd to me—looking at the back of her head.  My senses dulled as I listened vaguely to them speaking.  Finally, out of the blue, she said, “Lori, where are you?”  I snapped out of the daydream state I invariably slipped into, thinking, “Wow, she is actually speaking to me.”   

I reached forward and gently and lovingly placed my hand on her arm, feeling suddenly quite warm and sentimental, sure she was asking because she could neither hear nor see me from her current vantage point, and said, “I’m right here Great Grandma.”  And, then she sighed, turned to me and said, “No GOD DAMN IT, where are you in Germany?  Larry, what’s wrong with the girl?”

As I approve of a youth that has something of the old man in him, so I am no less pleased with an old man that has something of the youth. He that follows this rule may be old in body, but can never be so in mind.
~ Marcus Tullius Cicero

Feed Me

I like to call this little countdown I’m doing as the “no cooking” countdown where for 35 days I will probably subsist on Lean Cuisine’s and other microwavable delicacies.  As of tonight, I have one more meal to make before the kids wing off to Arizona for a few weeks.  My sistah, who last year cooked for me at least once a week during this summer period won’t be around this year to feed me–poor, poor pitiful me. 

The children love when Sistah comes to cook—the food is always good, healthy, plentiful for various hollow legs and lacks the usual dry/burnt taste and texture my offerings frequently provide.

So, tonight, we went out to eat and we will grab a little Quizno’s on Friday, leaving me only Thursday to come up with something that tastes like something kinda sorta edible. 

The other night, I was proud of myself for coming up with a meal.  I made some healthy rice and fresh veggies to go with the baked “basil chicken.”    My sis made it for us before, and I vaguely remembered what she did.  So, we ate it and it was okay, but I called her the next day and said, “That basil chicken just didn’t taste as good when I made it.”  She said, “Do you mean the rosemary chicken?”  Oops, all those crazy herbs and spices look the same to me.

She was stunned I didn’t know what a zester was, or the fact I don’t have a juicer or anything remotely resembling a food processor.  My meat mallet is the rubber mallet from the toolbox and none of my knives in my drawer are sharp (that is not a metaphor, dammit).  My pans are mostly Goodwill castoffs and a cheap set I got at Target.  Apparently, I should have paid attention in 8th grade home economics instead of leading that student rebellion that almost got me expelled.

But, my knowledge of all things cooking is exceeded only by my passion for cooking.  I rank the entire process right below scrubbing out toilets after a chili cookoff.

I keep hoping some kind soul (Sela Ward, are you listening?) will take pity on a poor girl and bring me gastronomic (and possibly other) joy in my hour of need, but, I have a feeling, that coupled with my dearth of dating applications, both my oven and I will die of loneliness this summer.

Cooking is like making love, you do it well, or you do not do it at all.
~ Harriet Van Horn

(I have a feeling I won’t get much practice at either this summer)

Help A Sistah Out

It’s Saturday morning.  It’s 6:30 a.m.  I am caffeinating myself.  I’ve given up trying to read the paper, it’s all “blah, blah, blah” this morning.  The puppy is looking at me expectantly.  She thinks we’re going for a walk in the park, as is our Monday through Friday custom.  We are not.  It’s Saturday. She doesn’t understand the concept of days of the week, though I’ve been talking to her about it—it’s just not getting through.

And I have to be at my sister’s in 30 minutes to help her clean her house for her open house.  This is the sisterwho is the queen of clutter.  The one who can magically transform a party-ready place into its former state of chaos within 15 minutes of the guests’ departure. 

When I asked her what exactly she needed help with as I have my own house to clean, she said, “You know, the things I don’t think about.” 

As the caffeine courses through me and my mind begins to wake, I’m wondering what those things could be–and I am afraid.

Does The Apple Fall From From The Tree, Part III

Grandma had a fairly normal existence for the time—school, chores, friends, church.  She was not her mother’s favorite, despite her status as the baby of the family—but her father, ah, well, they had a strong bond.  And, being so self-reliant, the family weathered the depression fairly well.

One day, somewhere around 17 years old, she went skating at the roller rink with her friends.  A tall, handsome blonde Scandinavian looking fellow, who was working on his uncle’s farm, was skating there as well.  Somewhere in the course of the evening, they bumped into each other—and kept bumping into each other for the next 65 years and counting. At 18 and 19 respectively, they married.  A year later, the first of two bouncing baby girls arrived—this one the one I would later call Mom.

Grandpa was an ambitious fellow and put himself through college, his young wife helping any way she could.  She stood by while he served during World War II, helped type his papers as he worked his way through his bachelor’s, master’s and finally his Ed.D, and came up with innovative ideas to save money on their tight budget.  She’s held the family together by making her own clothes, canning, gardening, and light farming all through those lean years when they moved from town to town, from teaching job to teaching job until the jobs got bigger and bigger.  Though grandma never went to college herself, she is one of the smartest women I’ve met.  She was always his biggest fan, and still is today.    She didn’t drive either, but she was happy to let my grandfather do so.   She’d found her role of a lifetime, yet never lost herself.

Long after moving to the “city,” Grandma’s oldest daughter met the boy from the wrong side of the tracks.  He was cool.  Really cool.  And, that was important.  At 16, she married, and at 18 was a Cold War soldier’s wife living in Germany when she had me.  I kind of always thought it was more to find her own freedom that she married so young.  But, she eventually got it right, marrying a definitely unbad boy—my stepdad.

So, here I am…the product of unique women who started life in the same era, in the same area, but with vastly different experiences.  Their families were about as different as they could be, but they both were or are the glue that held their family together.  Me–I ended up with a little bit of a wild streak and an equal share of good sense and stability—I count myself incredibly lucky for being part of both of them. 

I kind of like to think that a part of me represents all that is America.  I mean, look at me—I’m a Lesbian single mother of a multi-cultural family—I volunteer, am a veteran, pay my taxes, follow the Ten Commandments on principal rather than religious belief, and hope I’m a good citizen of the World.  My family of origin represents the old affluent, the new poor, the uneducated, the educated, the artistic and the pragmatic. 

That is what our Nation is to me, a patchwork of all those stories, woven together to create the country we have today.  That country used to welcome the immigrant, the religiously diverse, the right wing conservative, the leftie fuzzy-minded liberal, the bad boys, the wild child, the scholars, and the quiet men and women of integrity. 

I think Emma Lazarus said it best, and maybe that’s what we’ve lost these last few years as we work our way through the fear of terror on our home turf, the struggle over wars and loss of life to causes we don’t all believe are valid, our blind acceptance or impotent rebellion against our current administration and its questionable use of the tenets of our democracy: 

Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:

I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

Happy Birthday to my Grandmas—thanks for being you.

Does The Apple Fall From The Tree, Part II

Somehow, Grandma eventually found out about the kids–one ended up with the aunt in Ohio, two ended up with the bad boy’s family in Mississippi, and one ended up adopted by a minister in my hometown. 

I’m guessing the story leaves out many details and omits critical facts.  I’ve tried to piece the true story together over the years, but I doubt I’ll ever know the entire truth.  The kids never came home.  But, she was able to establish a relationship with three of them.  The one who was adopted would have contact with at least one of the siblings, but never again communicate with her mother or any of her other family.

In the late 1930s, Grandma met and married my Grandpa. He used to carry a news article around with him with pride—he had once been arrested for being suspected of being the fugitive bank robber John Dillinger.  Dillinger reportedly ripped through town from time to time to elude police as the town was chock full of railroad tracks and frequent trains to help Dillinger keep running.  Grandpa was always nice to us—but was always sort of not present emotionally.  He liked to smoke his stinky green cigars on the steps, wear his fedora, wear his pleated pants that were probably 20 years old, and go to the tavern every night after a hard day’s work. 

After they got married (a very unusual second for both of them), Grandma then gave birth to three more children, all boys—my father being the eldest of that family.  The cycle of poverty continued.  My father was raised in house in the city with no indoor plumbing. That was unusual even then.  They lived on the North End, the notoriously “bad” side of town.  They never owned their own home.  She never learned to drive.  She had no way out, even if she’d wanted one

The boys had to work to make money for themselves.   My dad, with a strong work ethic, and a desire for freedom of his own, eventually saved enough to buy his own car.  Tall, dark, and handsome, he started traveling to my neighboring hometown, where the girls were mighty fine.  Eventually, he met my mother, who was, I believe 14 to his 17.  My mother must have had a penchant for bad boys herself, for she was smitten.

My maternal grandmother just celebrated her 84^th birthday.   She was born to a farming family as well.  The youngest of three, she adored her father, who was a creative and intelligent man full of good sense and kindness.   Her father worked many jobs besides the farm, including being a talented carpenter who built many of the finely crafted homes in the area.  I always pictured him as the man all the neighbors came to when they needed wisdom or advice.  Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t, but that’s how I see him.  I also think of him as a man of simple, yet profound integrity. 

This side of the family could trace its roots back several hundred years—perhaps thousands.  They led the kind of lives where things were written down to pass on to the next generation.  There are family bibles, historical documents, organized family tree groups who track and trace the lineage through the generations.  This grandma’s family came over from England soon after the Mayflower, but the ones who fled the New England area fled for freedom and the opportunity for self-reliance in the new West (the Midwest).  There are several illustrious relatives from all walks of life; but there was a plethora of ministers, educators, attorneys, adventurers, and politicians.   I think there were a couple of whack jobs in there too, but what family doesn’t have at least one? 

Stay tuned for part three of Does the Apple Fall Far From the Tree?

If you don’t know [your family's] history, then you don’t know anything. You are a leaf that doesn’t know it is part of a tree.
–Michael Crichton