Cousins

The cousins are visiting. Nieces and nephew to me, but first cousins to my kids, and it works just like I remember it working.

I always loved my encounters with cousins as a kid. Wherever you went, if there was a cousin you had an automatic friend. It didn’t matter if you were 1st cousins, 2nd cousins, or 3rd cousins once removed. It didn’t matter if they were boy cousins or girl cousins, a little older or a little younger cousins… a cousin, by definition, was someone you could count on.

My dad used to take us all over the country on summer trips and inevitably we’d end up meeting a cousin or two we never knew existed. In Florida when I was about 10, I met my cousins Steve and Mike. Steve was a little bit older. Mike was exactly my age. Even today, I’d have to stop and think about exactly how we were related. My father and their father, I believe, were first cousins, so that would have made us second generation. It didn’t really matter, however. Mike and Steve took me around town (or maybe it was just around their block) and showed me all the things 10-year-old kids did in Florida, which was pretty similar, believe it or not, to the things 10-year-old kids did in Kansas. Except… they drank their tea sweet. I nearly spit the stuff all over myself when I took my first big swig as I sat on the porch of one of their neighbors trying to act cool as if I drank tea all the time. Plain ole’ tea was bad enough, but the sugar in that stuff they shared with me in Florida could have held the spoon up on its own. Still makes me shudder to think about it.

Sometimes we met cousins who came from even smaller and more rural places than our own. Johnna was one such cousin, near enough to my age that we enjoyed each other’s company for the few days my family visited hers in Missouri. Never in my life had I felt like such a big city girl as the two days I spent hanging out with my cousin, Johnna. She took me fiddle-stompin’. I let her listen to music on my headphones that she had never heard.

In Oregon I remember meeting and hanging out with my older cousin, Shiryla. She was way cool and we exchanged letters for quite a few years after we met. There was cousin Bob in Idaho (way cute) and a half dozen other boys whose names and faces blur together, but man was it fun to be part of such a large crowd for the few days we visited.

Not all cousins were great, of course. My cousin Lyle, a few years older (we met when we were teens) was arrogant and rude as far as I was concerned. I got a kick out of my younger cousin, Rocky, however, (Lyle’s nephew) and managed to enjoy that trip, as well.

The best cousins, of course, were the ones who lived right down the road and my cousins from Oklahoma who spent nearly every summer with us. And even though we go years and years as adults without seeing each other, every time I’ve managed to hook up with them it’s just like when we were kids. We just yammer and chat and find it easy to hang out. Something about shared blood just makes things comfortable.

The cousins that are here this evening are near-perfect age mates for my own kids. The oldest two had seven years of living right down the road from each other before we moved away, so it’s easy to see how these girls click and seem to have an understanding of each other that runs deep. The boys, however, have barely spent more than a week full of days together in their entire lives. Mine was still in diapers when we left and my nephew not yet born. But all evening long they have been running around like they’ve known each other forever.

There’s just something about a cousin. They’re familiar in ways that only family can be.

Procrastination #793

The last couple of days I've gotten up in the morning to find that my head is not at all where it needs to be. Assuming it needs to be sitting in front of the computer meeting deadlines... which it does. But sometimes I get these bright ideas. Like this morning, it felt like a good morning to see how many people could I ask to be "friends" on Facebook. (I found 7, and 3 have already responded positively, thank you very much.) Facebook made me think of MySpace, of course, so I had to go see how my "friends" on MySpace are doing. Then I had to check in on the Xanganites and blog friends in general, of course.

This connected world is a curse and a blessing, I swear.

Eventually my kids were up and wandering around the kitchen so I got another bright idea. How about I spend the morning with them and go back to deal with my deadlines later in the day? Late afternoon, perhaps, or evening. Yeah, right!

Maybe it is this summer weather contributing to my monkey mind. I've been contemplating things like spring cleaning (getting kind of late for that, no?). My stack of important stuffs on my desk is populated with household fix-it lists, 4-H projects, and a list of other fun summer distractions the kids and I have been concocting.

The afternoon came and went with an oil change for the car, a failed attempt to get the net up on the trampoline, and a trip to the vet for the dog. Talk about burning through a day.

It's now about the time I usually start thinking seriously about bed and that deadline (which is tomorrow!) remains untouched. The internal debate begins. Do I struggle with it in these evening hours which tend not to be my best? Do I get a good night's sleep and let the adrenalin of a final deadline bring me across the finish line?

Maybe I'll just check my email one last time and call it a night.

Timeless Tuesday: Grandparents in 1933

Sam and Christena: 1933

My Grandmother passed away in 1976, so most of my memories of my grandfather are without her. He spent the next 20 years missing her greatly. He talked about her often. Through his eyes, I knew her as a beautiful and strong woman.

He had a small picture on the wall (it may have been a painting) of her when she was about this age. Even though I remembered my grandmother much older and without her hair (chemotherapy treatments), I was always very aware that this was the picture my grandfather visualized when he talked about her.

Grandpa Sam was a card. He always wore pin-striped overalls and he liked to fish. Better than that, he liked to tell fish stories. All kinds of stories, actually. Much of my time with grandpa was spent trying to decide just how hard he was pulling my leg. I'd watch him go breathless with laughter before he even got to the punchline, and I never quite knew if I should laugh, as well, or nod my head as if I seriously understood.

When I was about ten, Grandpa brought me home a dog, Popo, a little silver poodle. The dog had been intended as a gift for Grandpa, of course. It wasn't long before the relatives in Iowa sent him home with a second dog, a small terrier named Tara. Grandpa resisted, but Tara soon became Grandpa's best gal pal. She went everywhere with Grandpa. She had her own special seat in his car and in the winter she would burrow under a blanket on her seat in the car and wait for him while he was in church.

When Grandpa said, "give me some love," Tara would stand up on Grandpa's lap and nuzzle his neck. She got a little bit fat from Grandpa's spoiling, but she was a good companion for him for many years.

Flowers in My Hair

This weekend my son kept bringing me flowers for my hair. First it was a dandelion. Then it was a little sprig of bridalwreath. Finally he found some tiny purple flowers growing in the yard and he brought them to replace the other selections saying they were the most special flowers of all and, therefore, were for me.

I spent the day feeling mighty special. Nothing sweeter than getting flowers for your hair from a handsome boy.

Sunday Book Review: the girl who stopped swimming

I don't know what I like more about Joshilyn Jackson, her blog or her novels. She's good reading all the way around. Her third novel, the girl who stopped swimming, did not disappoint. From the first chapter I was in love with Laurel, a woman who is greeted by the ghost of a neighborhood girl who has just drowned in the swimming pool in Laurel's yard.

The novel doesn't exactly move with the thrill or anxiety of a who-dunnit. It is more of a journey through personalities, families, and places (like all of Jackson's novels, really) that are eccentric, yet touchingly familiar. I like the novel's characters, but I especially like the way her characters think and feel and love. Even the irritating ones are redeemable.

Jackson definitely keeps me on her fan list with this one.

Who da' thunk... rhubarb fans

We bought a CSA (community supported agriculture) share this year. I think I'm going to be a big fan of a garden harvest when I don't actually have to get out there every day and do the gardening myself.

It is currently the time of year for spring greens. We've been getting leaf lettuce at the farmer's market, some spring onions, some spinach. Eating lots of salad around our house. Tuesday we picked up red sails and romaine lettuce. We also got a pound of rhubarb. The kids were skeptical. Hubby was a bit skeptical, as well. And while I recall being skeptical about rhubarb once upon a time, I also remember my mom and grandma making rhubarb and strawberry pie.

Since we didn't have any strawberries, I looked up a rhubarb crisp recipe and middle munchkin and I got to work. Smelled wonderful while cooking. Tasted delicious.

Post Mother's Day Thoughts

Timeliness aside, I would like to report that I had a marvelous Mother's Day. But honestly, most days spent with my family are marvelous and I am a person who indulges in a lot of those days. It was nice to use Mother's Day as an excuse to completely tune out the need to's, however. The lawn got mowed -- mostly hubby, but munchkin #1 and I took a turn, as well. We took a bike ride to the zoo. We grilled burgers. We shot a few baskets. We walked the dogs. It was a wonderfully relaxing day.

In honor of Mother's Day and Timeless Tuesday, here are a few of my favorite mom photos.


Me and Middle Munchkin - 1999 (I think I look a lot like my mom in this picture.)

My Mom and all of her munchkins (Dad's there, too).

Grandma with my aunt Gerry (left) and my mom (right).