The Story of Me: In Aunts part 2

The Middle Child

I'm sorry to say I have less stories about the eldest of my dad's younger sisters (the one in the lower right side of the above pic). She had long ago moved to Calgary, so even the short years I spent in Edmonton I didn't see her much. So let's call her Calgary. She was married to Some Guy, I know nothing about him, or even when they divorced. They had no children. When I was around 10 (?) she started dating a Wealthy Older Man and they've been together, unmarried, since. They didn't have kids either, just little dogs.

I suspect I also know less about Calgary because my father didn't know her as well, and maybe because she's the most like my father. Friendly but sort of reserved or private. (And notice how they both got the hell out of Edmonton at an early age?)

If Aunt Calgary is the Patron Saint of something, I wouldn't be privileged enough to know what that is. But let me try to say 3 Things About Her anyway.

1. When I was about 11 or so, and visiting back in Edmonton, I felt like I was at an awkward in-between stage. My twin cousins were old enough to be Interesting to Grown Ups. And my little cousin who was also visiting was Still Little & Cute (though she was, interestingly, the only witness to The Famous Grandma Contre-temps. I'm sure she doesn't remember.) But one day Aunt Calgary was visiting, and I felt like she was the only one who took an interest in me. So for many years I called her My Favourite Aunt.

And she was just generally pretty and warm and interested in children, sort of like my step-mother. When you're an 11 year old girl you just love a Pretty & Interested-in-you Woman. I would imagine she's pretty universally liked amongst my Edmontonian cousins.

2. When in town for my grandmother's wedding I had tea one day with Aunt Calgary. And all I can remember from it was my shock when she expressed some sort of belief that the very high numbers of deaths in foreign (African) countries was just nature's way of culling the species, so what can we do? If I had been old enough to be Marxist, I suppose I would have seen her married-into-wealth as the source of this Malthusian Shpleckiness. I'm sure I tried to talk her out of it, though I don't know what I said.

*Political Aside: I mean, yes, you can see Mother Nature's hand in any death on this planet, but if you're going to use this as a reason for holding a Well-What-Can-We-Do? attitude, then I have to be Out. If it's true what Dando said, that "Natural factors cause crop failures, but humans cause famines" then there's certainly room for human guilt. Not to mention it's not for us to decide Evolution (Natural Selection) is at Work and there's nothing we can do--westerners are the *fittest* or whatever. Evolution happens over millions of years, and there's no saying what's *fit* since we can't predict future changes in our environment. We should instead concentrate on what we think is ethical, or just.

Anyway, I'm not trying to charge my aunt with callousness--it's only a vaguely recalled conversation, and possibly an outgrown opinion. I'm just saying... the memory stayed with me.

3. Several year ago she got a pair of antique earrings framed--one for me, one for one of my cousins--along with a photo of the relative of ours' who owned it (I can never remember who--what generation.) It's totally beautiful, and the only heirloom I own that goes back more than a couple generations. Probably my only regret at not having kids is that I have no one to pass it on to, so I intend to pass it back to one of my cousins' daughters when I'm Oldy.

The Story of Me: In Aunts

I was born in Edmonton, but I wasn't there long. We moved to Winnipeg, moved back to Ed a couple years, and then we were gone for good.

Both my parents were born in Edmonton, so that's where the bulk of my genetic-relatives live, though I rarely see them. Having moved away from relatives at such a young age, I don't have a very strong sense of extended family. I saw my step-mother's family more often growing up (grade 6 onward), but they're French so the language difference always created a little bit of a barrier. They all live in the Townships, so without a car I don't see them often either.

I understand why some people create their own communities around them--I'm certainly closer to my friends than to my extended family. But... with all that said... my genetic families are pretty weird people, and I can't deny being related to them since I've inherited the weirdness. (Understand that weird is a compliment in my books.)

My dad has three sisters and they've all led interesting lives. I'm not very good at the details, but they go something like this...

Eldest Child

I'll call her Lipstick, since she once wrote PIG in lipstick across my dad's stuffed dog. (Every time my dad tells this story she just giggles unapologetically.) She had a teen pregnancy (who was adoped out, but it's happy endings all around because Lipstick and her biological daughter are now friends) and then she had a boy and twin daughters. There's a lot of sad history in here which I won't relate, but my aunt's a survivor and ...plucky.

Here is my deceased grandfather, my still-kicking-it-old-school
grandmother, and their children. The one in the middle,
looking so Sweet and Petite is Aunt Lipstick.
Don't let appearances fool you. She's very street.

I can't speak for what sort of mother she was, but all the same time she's a sort of Patron Saint of Children. I've never heard her speak of her children without FIERCE PROTECTIVE love. Probably the sort of love that drives you up the wall, but can't possibly leave you in doubt to its genuineness. A complete mother bear. I have 3 defining memories of her (and no, Pablo, they don't involve a spoon):

1. When I was 11 I had a sort of contre-temps with my grandmother (my dad's mother.) I didn't speak to her for a year after, and though my mother supported me through it, I never felt like my dad was on my side about it. (To this day I can't figure out where his head was during this... my father's a bit of a sphinx sometimes.) When I was about 14 I was in Edmonton for my grandmother's wedding, and stayed with Aunt Lipstick, and that's when I found out that she'd heard of this whole thing with my grandmother. And had been furious, because apparently the way my grandmother spoke to me, she'd done to her daughters as well. And Most Excellent Aunt Lipstick called her mother up and gave her a talking to.

Can I describe how wonderful this made me feel? To find out that someone from my dad's side of the family had understood and stood up for me? I probably didn't fully forgive my grandmother until I found this out. God bless my Aunt Lipstick--the Patron Saint of Children came through for me.

2. The father of Lipstick's children was a womanizing sort of charmer, who had an affair and left Lipstick for the Affairee. They lived together for years until he got Lou Gherig's (I think) and she dumped him. And guess who helped to care for him? Yes, my aunt. But when he was incapacitated, sitting in that wheelchair and unable to escape her wrath, she finally let him have it. Not even for shit he'd done for her (if I remember this story right) but for shit that had affected her children. That's the Patron Saint again. I was very proud when I heard this story.

3. The last time I saw Aunt Lipstick she was visiting my parents out here in Quebec, and the only conversation I can remember having with her was about her grandchildren. The grandkids have gone through their own share of Parental Troubles, and Aunt Lipstick stands up for them too. The world has got to be a better place because women like this are in it.

So while I'm not very attentive to my Edmonton Family, I'll always love them, in my own Distant Way.

Revenge of the midge!

My midges had disappeared for a couple days, but now they are back! I'm working in the kitchen, and their little corpses keep falling on the computer (as they dash themselves against the light.)

Nombly hard at work, editing my book

Of course, before my love affair with K'Naan, there was (and will always be) Wyclef

"What do you mean I end up in jail?! Motherf**ker!"

When I met Gilby he used to talk about His Bestest Friend In the Whole World, Alfonse. Alfonse has lived in the US since I've known him (he's a brainy scientist, now working on turning algae into fuel), now in San Diego, married to a Pretty Intelligent Witty Blonde (what shall I call her? Mrs Alfonse?) who used to write a great blog about not dieting for one year.

Mrs Alfonse took in some plays at Stratford this summer and she brought me back 2 gifts: Oscar Wilde finger puppet, and a mini booklet of Oscar quotes. Can you believe that? How classy is this dame!

Here is Finger Oscar becoming familiar with his life story.
I wonder if I should stop him before he gets to the last
few chapters.

Here is poses next to himself. I love that they made
his head dipping to one side, just like in the photos.
He's a dreamer, our Oscar.

Here's some safer reading material,
and more his size too.

And here he is with a pen up his bum
(no somdomite jokes please).
Instead of dying lonely and ruined in Paris,
he sits here, immortal, inspiring my writing.

Now... I think we should work our way through the quote book.

Women are sphinxs without secrets.

This is me still being Madly In Love

I can't get over my huge crush on K'Naan's music. K'Naan I looooooooooove you!!!!!!!!

Here's another song--this one about what it's like waiting for a desperately needed money transfer from someone who's helping you out; and then turns to how he can now transfer money back to his grandmother; and it ends with "shout outs" to people who financially helped him out in hard times.

No wonder when you look at the comments people leave for K'Naan on youtube, they're all about how he's saving rap music from a surplus of thug culture.

...And if you think it isn't fun to sing "you can pick it up toDAY it's fifteenminutesawAY" while trotting home from work, well, then you iz foolin' yourself.