Just in time for my cabin adventure, my cousin Carl published his Henderson genealogy book...good stuff--there are over 77 thousand names in it. Told you the Henderson's were a huge group of people!
I saw names in there of kids I went to school with and rode the bus with my whole life...kids who bullied me, too! I saw the name of my maternal uncle's wife...oh what a wonderful world...oddly enough she's also kin to me on my father's paternal grandmother's side as well as on his maternal grandfather's side! When she and my uncle married, I was 7. In my eyes, she was the most beautiful woman in the world. Only one other woman in my "fairy tale" world would ever come close to being as beautiful as my Auntie Malinda was and is...and that was Lady Diana Spencer. So, in my head, Malinda was a princess and my uncle was the luckiest man in the world. I didn't even know her prior to my mother's brother dating and marrying her. I remember when she was in the Fairest of the Fair one of the first years he dated her...I subsequently wore the same dress to my first prom, in the ninth grade. She's also the aunt (along with my uncle)who took me to see "Psycho II", "Clash of the Titans", "Star Wars", and also "ET", after whose viewing I questioned loudly of my very pregnant aunt, in front of everyone, "Are you CRYING??" Aunt Malinda was (and is) the very essence of a smart, southern woman, and she has the most kind and caring parents. They're just good people. Auntie Malinda-I never called her "Aunt" growing up for some reason. It was always just "Malinda". After I became a mother, I really got to thinking that it might hurt her feelings for me not to call her "Aunt" so I started saying "Auntie Malinda"...pronouncing "aunt" differently from the word "ant" in this case...and I cannot for the life of me figure out why I say it that way. But I do it because the longer I know her, the more I love her. Just can't help it. And now, years later, discovering that we were more than just relatives via marriage means more to me than I can describe. The woman who came and picked me up and took me to church. Who let me wear her clothes when I didn't have anything appropriate to wear...who gave an unmarried, very pregnant niece the loveliest baby shower...who loaned same new mother every piece of baby furniture she had...who didn't get mad when a 14 year old girl backed her car into a wall...and let me work weekly cleaning her house so I could afford a pair of red stripe Nikes...back when they were all the rage..
I can never tell you all the things she and my uncle have done for me, for my family. She is one of a kind, and I am proud that she is in my life.
So, this isn't really a posting about the cabin...but it is just something that was in my heart and I needed the world to know...
I love my Auntie Malinda!
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Monday, March 5, 2012
The Family Circle
"Will the circle...be unbroken...by and by, Lord, by and by...
There's a better...home awaiting...in the sky Lord in the sky..."
You think about your family---some people don't care one generation to the next about where they came from...they only care about where they are going. That's okay--I can understand that, I guess. I have a little harder time "getting it", I guess, because I don't think you can understand the magnitude of where you are unless you see where you've been...
My family wasn't rich. We weren't even middle class, but we did have a home, heat, and food. We didn't wear name brand clothes, and a lot of my clothes were hand-me-downs from a cousin out West. I don't even know where my brothers' clothes came from, really, I just know they had them. My parents loved us--my brothers and me. That's what mattered. I never quite understood what made them tick, though, until I became an adult and started researching our family tree. I don't know what made me do it---maybe having my own child, or maybe even searching my own self for something familiar that I didn't see reflected in the faces of those surrounding me--my family, my blood.
My mother's family was from Georgia, my father's from Tennessee. That's what I knew. My mom and my aunt had done some research--back when everything was still in ledger books and on microfilm. I had it much easier...a little money a month, and I had access to everything under the sun--all at the touch of a button. Census records, marriage records, birth and death...the circles were of life...history began to take on new meaning to me, and with every era, a new face presented itself to me.
I saw that my gumline and teeth were inherited from my maternal grandmother's side, while my blue eyes came from my paternal grandfather. But what I really wanted to know was if you could inherit spirit.
I looked at all the different parts of each of the families that were combined--I saw a short fuse on one branch of the family--irrational anger that struck out at anything in it's path. I saw children forced to compete with each other for the approval of their parents, when nothing they did would ever be good enough. I saw a pride so strong from another side that it prevented any chance of ever being successful for fear of owing another man a dollar. I saw music drip out of fingertips and off the tips of tongues--scenes being painted at the touch of a simple pencil to paper... I saw a love for one's children and family so strong that hearts were broken when that love wasn't taken nearly as seriously by the ones being loved...all of these things were very real, but not necessarily coded into my DNA...at least, I don't think so. I'm not a scientist, don't remotely know what could be in those microscopic cells...but would those things actually become a part of who I am?
I think they are. I get irritated quickly--especially when I feel people are being arrogant. I don't, however, get jealous when my brothers or other relatives do well or receive rewards for being successful people. I panic when I make a mistake in my home accounting--because I am so scared of being without money---but I do have loans and buy things when we need them. I can read music and sing, and my love of art goes far beyond the normal realm of just having pictures to hang on a wall. I have a love for my family that cannot be touched---even as heartbroken as some of them have made me, I understand that not everyone can love like I love, without surrender.
It's all part of who we are...where we came from. You just can't forget those things. You know, someone once told me that there is nothing irrelevant or unimportant in the Bible, whether you believe it or not. I agree with that, and, as a Christian, I do happen to believe it. There are an awful lot of "begats" and "begots" in there--and you know why? Because they are important.
So, here's to your roots--your heritage--who you are...
There's a better...home awaiting...in the sky Lord in the sky..."
You think about your family---some people don't care one generation to the next about where they came from...they only care about where they are going. That's okay--I can understand that, I guess. I have a little harder time "getting it", I guess, because I don't think you can understand the magnitude of where you are unless you see where you've been...
My family wasn't rich. We weren't even middle class, but we did have a home, heat, and food. We didn't wear name brand clothes, and a lot of my clothes were hand-me-downs from a cousin out West. I don't even know where my brothers' clothes came from, really, I just know they had them. My parents loved us--my brothers and me. That's what mattered. I never quite understood what made them tick, though, until I became an adult and started researching our family tree. I don't know what made me do it---maybe having my own child, or maybe even searching my own self for something familiar that I didn't see reflected in the faces of those surrounding me--my family, my blood.
My mother's family was from Georgia, my father's from Tennessee. That's what I knew. My mom and my aunt had done some research--back when everything was still in ledger books and on microfilm. I had it much easier...a little money a month, and I had access to everything under the sun--all at the touch of a button. Census records, marriage records, birth and death...the circles were of life...history began to take on new meaning to me, and with every era, a new face presented itself to me.
I saw that my gumline and teeth were inherited from my maternal grandmother's side, while my blue eyes came from my paternal grandfather. But what I really wanted to know was if you could inherit spirit.
I looked at all the different parts of each of the families that were combined--I saw a short fuse on one branch of the family--irrational anger that struck out at anything in it's path. I saw children forced to compete with each other for the approval of their parents, when nothing they did would ever be good enough. I saw a pride so strong from another side that it prevented any chance of ever being successful for fear of owing another man a dollar. I saw music drip out of fingertips and off the tips of tongues--scenes being painted at the touch of a simple pencil to paper... I saw a love for one's children and family so strong that hearts were broken when that love wasn't taken nearly as seriously by the ones being loved...all of these things were very real, but not necessarily coded into my DNA...at least, I don't think so. I'm not a scientist, don't remotely know what could be in those microscopic cells...but would those things actually become a part of who I am?
I think they are. I get irritated quickly--especially when I feel people are being arrogant. I don't, however, get jealous when my brothers or other relatives do well or receive rewards for being successful people. I panic when I make a mistake in my home accounting--because I am so scared of being without money---but I do have loans and buy things when we need them. I can read music and sing, and my love of art goes far beyond the normal realm of just having pictures to hang on a wall. I have a love for my family that cannot be touched---even as heartbroken as some of them have made me, I understand that not everyone can love like I love, without surrender.
It's all part of who we are...where we came from. You just can't forget those things. You know, someone once told me that there is nothing irrelevant or unimportant in the Bible, whether you believe it or not. I agree with that, and, as a Christian, I do happen to believe it. There are an awful lot of "begats" and "begots" in there--and you know why? Because they are important.
So, here's to your roots--your heritage--who you are...
This is the story of one side of my family...and how they came to be down in tha Holler...and how I got back to that same Holler, two hundred years later.
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