The family visit

It just occurred to me that I never told you how the visit went with my dad’s niece, and, her family.

As you may recall, our slightly anti-social hero (my father) had a brother (my uncle) who died back in March. My uncle had three daughters (my dad’s nieces, my cousins) who we didn’t know very well. As a matter of fact, I’d never met them, as they are much older than I am, and, closer to my dad’s age.

The oldest daughter has 5 adult children. She and four of them decided to come visit this summer to see her father’s grave, and, to visit some of her childhood haunts, and, show her kids some of their family history.

Since this niece doesn’t appear to have a lot of money, I asked my dad where they were staying. In his own inimitable way, “He replies, “Not with me!” Lovely.

It turned out that she did need to stay with him, but, the kids were staying at a hotel which was fine by him.

My father is a man of order, and, any variation on the order doesn’t always sit well with him. The visit started out a little bumpy when we realized they were all coming on different flights, and, most of the flights were late. As a matter of fact, one of them didn’t end up getting here the first night, at all.

There was also an extra person we didn’t know about, so, that stressed him a bit because of his carefully laid out transportation plans. And, we had no idea how long they were planning to be here.

The first morning of the visit, I called my dad to see how he was holding up since his niece is a talker. Boy, what a talker. She is great, I really like her, but, did I mention she talks? A lot?

My dad, not so much.

OK, I called him to laugh at him because the rest of the group hadn’t even gotten up yet, and, it was something like 11am, and, he was stuck at Target with her buying something for her cell phone. He is a 5 am riser, and, not a shopper.

Anyway, the group did eventually motivate, and, he took us on a tour of places significant to the family history. Of course, it was one of the hottest days in history, here, but, it was enjoyable. The rest of the days were similar, and, the last day I had everyone over to my house for a cookout.

My dad really had a good time, when he got grumpy (not often, but, I was mortified at least once), they just laughed at him and remarked how much like their grandfather (his brother) he is.

For me, it was completely wild to meet people related to me. I’m an only child, and, I grew up with no extended family except grandparents and my uncle. How odd to see these young men running around looking like my dad, but, not being anything like him.

What an experience talking to my cousin, too. She’s only about 10 years younger than my dad, so, her memories of our grandparents are nothing like mine. I never knew our grandmother (my dad’s mother), and, she told me a lot of stuff that certainly explains a lot about my dad.

Anyway, the visit went well, I really enjoyed the group, they are people I could be friends with if we lived closer to each other, and, still very strange for me to say, “I hung out with my cousins”.