My Aunt

What a long, painful, awful week. Things started out fine, then my world was rocked on Tuesday. I was with my mom when she got the call that her sister had passed away suddenly. It was a shock, she had had health problems, but we, I, wasn’t ready for it.


My aunt was funny. The ladies in her bridge club that came thru the visitation line at the funeral home kept repeating that. They said how much they loved her stories, and how funny she was. And she was, a great sense of humor, and truly one of the best story tellers I know. She actually was the one who set my parents up on a blind date. I remember sitting up late with her on one of our family trips and her telling me the story. It was hysterical, she was hysterical. That’s what I’ll miss, talking to her. You know regrets, well, mine is that we didn’t have more talks, especially in the past few years. See, my aunt and I had several things in common, I was named after her, we both were first children (if you aren’t a first child you won’t understand, but that opened up a whole world of issues and commonalities for us to talk about), and we were numbers people. She was very smart, quick to figure things out. She was also a really good listener, something I want to learn from. It was said at the funeral her daughters said she was one to let you make your own decisions and not judge or give I told you so’s. I’d never thought about it like that, but that’s true. As I got older and she had more family, it seemed like we didn’t see each other as much, and definitely didn’t have as many talks, but I do remember a Veteran’s Day just a few years ago, when I ended up at breakfast with my mom, my aunt, and my uncle after a school program our little kids were in. It was the best breakfast, I got them all to myself, to talk, to laugh, to enjoy.

So what will I remember, and what do I want to mimic in my own life… her listening skills, her humor, and her love of family. I think each one of her brothers and sisters had a special bond with her. I think both me and my sister had a special bond with her. She had that ability.