The Story Of Me

It is just two days until Thanksgiving and I'm getting ready for a houseful. I'm feeling a little melancholy thinking about who will be here Thursday and who won't be. This post is more for me than anything else. I'd like to share with y'all the ones responsible for who I am, so indulge me.My Mother and Daddy married shortly after WWII. Daddy was gorgeous in his uniform and Mother was a beauty but never knew it. Look at his eyelashes and her hands. Why oh why couldn't I have inherited those things instead of his knees and her lack of a posterior? And of course, I had to get THE nose! All 3 of their kids got THE nose. But I also like to think I got their sense of humor and love of life. They were both junkers before it was cool to like junk. I was raised going to used furniture stores, second hand shops and junkyards.

Some of y'all have been fortunate enough to get to meet my baby sister, Kerri. She was born 3 years after me and my earliest memory is of her. Mother said I just swooped in and took over. She and I have had the joy of being sisters and best friends. I've pulled crap on her and she's pulled crap on me, but we've always been able to make each other laugh. During the last 2 years of our Mother's life, I don't think either of us would have made it through without each other. She will be with me Thanksgiving with her family who I adore.

Until I married Cat Daddy, this was life. On the left is my grandfather, Tip. He cussed like a sailor, chewed tobacco and was a hoot. He'd take us 3 kids to the jockey lot in McKinney every Saturday morning to buy tamales and cokes from the Tamale Man. My grandmother was a beauty shop operator. You have to remember in the 50's and 60's, women rarely worked outside of the home and no one's grandmother did. Kerri and I got all the latest hairstyles, including but not limited to, pixies which always looked cute on her and dorky on me. Tip, Marie, Joe and Helen were the original road trippers, loading all of us into a station wagon to drive where ever for a weekend.(Marie was busy taking this photo). This particular excursion was to Roaring Rivers in Missouri. That's my brother David being all hip and cool. If you can't tell by looking at the knees, that's me in the middle and Kerri on the end.

This is another weekend outing, this time to Devil's Den for a family reunion. David's on the coke box(would love to still have that) and that cute little girl is me. The guy in the middle is a cousin and again, Marie hiding from the camera. We lost Daddy right before Thanksgiving 1988, Tip, Easter 1998, Mother, Labor Day 1998, and Marie, New Year's 2001. So, I guess you can understand why I'm feeling a little sad, but don't feel sorry for me cause I'm not throwing a pity party here. I am so thankful that this was the life God gave me and these were the people to fill it. My cup runneth over!