obituary bingo

Add three sisters whose average age is 75+, a visitors' book from their father's funeral in 1960 and what do you get?  Obituary bingo!

Don't get me wrong, I am not being disrespectful, I am being joyful.  To witness such a thing was food for my starving heart.  I came away a renewed woman.

Quickly:  There were four cousins who grew up together.  Linda who is 2 years older than I, Peggy and Susan who are a year older, and me.  We were not the only cousins (there were probably 40 of them) but the ones closest in age. 

The relationships were strained.  Linda, Peggy and Susan's connection was that their mothers were sisters.  I was my father who connected me to the tribe.  My mother wasn't overly fond of the sisters, nor were they crazy about the woman who married their baby brother.

Fifty years later, after my father died, I felt my connection to the family was severed.

A week ago, when Susan called to ask me to bring my mother and Aunt Katy (the oldest living sibling of 12, she's 84) to her house, I agreed.  Susan and her husband John live 2 hours from me, on the Juniata River.

The ride there was ...  strange?  Ever see the movie, Driving Miss Daisy?

When we got there, Peggy and Linda and Linda's mother were there too as well as Aunt Helen, the baby of the family with her husband Bill, and Maria, their daughter.

We started slowly.  We come from the same place, but our lives were so different.  Susan and John have two grown kids and are semi retired, living on the river and traveling.  Linda and her husband Dick have been married forever and have no children.  Peggy married at 46 to a much younger man and has never had children.  Maria is young, skinny, gorgeous, smart, has wonderful kids (her daughter was there, she's about 12 and adorable)...but she's not part of the core group, so we can't let her inflate our scores.

Suddenly, I walked into the kitchen to hear Aunt Katie mention the name of a family friend - a name that I haven't heard in years.

"Dead," says Aunt Francie.

"Frank's sister, Phyllis," Aunt Katie goes on.

"Oh, dead too!" says Aunt Helen almost cheerfully.

What?  Have I stumbled onto our own family version of Arsinec and Old Lace?

Then I find the reason for the roll call:  the guest book from Grandpa's funeral.

In 1960, after the funeral,the book was given to my father, the youngest son.  Why?  We're not sure.  When my mother was cleaning out my father's belongings after his death last year, she decided to return it to the family.

I returned to the deck.  My cousins asked what the mothers were doing.  I explained.

"Obituary bingo!" Susan's husband John exclaimed.  When we're old we can play it too!

Can we?  I hope we'll have time...you never know!

After laughing so hard our sides hurt, eating so much our bellies ached, hugging...oh how we hugged...and me realizing I do have a family...we left.

It was one of the days I'll write about forever...five cousins, one much younger, walking along the Juniata river on a warm summer day...

Susan, thank you from the bottom of my hunky heart...I do have a family!

And to Aunt Katy:  Yes, I did nurse my son until he was four...but no, you are not too old to hear that...you are the perfect age.  Tomorrow you won't remember it!

I apologise for the quality of the photo...we were having too much fun to remember our cameras!

From left...mom, Aunt Katy, the eldest, Aunt Helen, the baby, Aunt Francie!