Today is my Pop's birthday. He would have been 89. While he is usually hovering around in the back of my mind, today he was there most of the day. Which may be why I had my epiphany on family traits.
It all started when I was texting yet another cutest-cat-ever photo to my brother. He and I have a friendly rivalry over whose cat does the funniest thing or sleeps in the best positions. As I hit send, a memory hit me.
Right after I graduated from high school, I went to visit my aunt in San Antonio for two weeks. We drove to Austin to visit with my grandfather's two aunts, Bessie and Bertie. Bertie had married but it didn't last and Bessie never married. After Bertie's divorce they lived together for years in a little house surrounded by fig trees and their succession of beloved cats.
They were thrilled to have visitors and set up a card table in the backyard complete with a luncheon cloth and matching napkins. After lunch they pulled out huge photo albums of their cats. Pictures of cats sleeping in the sink on a hot day. Cats being cute, cats hunting, cats with mice on porch, cats being cats. They doted on their cats. I remember thinking "I don't think this will ever be me." Oops!
I, too, have many many pictures of all the pets I have loved over the years--being sweet, being funny, being bad. You name it. I have large digital albums instead of snapshots in a photo album. Same difference.
If you consider me the apple, I don't think I fell. I think I am firmly attached to the family tree. It could be nature or nurture or just plain human traits, but I continue to manifest my family members in what comes out of my mouth (or goes in), in my likes, dislikes and behaviors. What I do and how I do it mostly spring from the family.
I had been chewing on this for part of the day. My brother stopped by to help me with some heavy lifting and organizing. We were trying to move stuff around in the garage to make more storage room. He was pushing me to get of rid of stuff too, which is always a good thing.
He came to four large dishpacks from when I was moving in and wondered what was in them. Er, um. More boxes? He just looked at me and asked "Are you channeling Hazel?" Hazel was our maternal grandmother and after she died I can't even begin to tell you how many boxes filled with empty boxes we found. Shoe boxes filled with small boxes were the most prevalent. You never know when you are going to need a box.
I had to laugh. It was one more branch on my tree.
Yes, I broke all the boxes down and put them in the recycle bin.
(disappointed). Where's the cat pictures? Get my hopes up and dash them all! LOL - lovely post.
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