Where do I begin to tell you about my family? I suppose I should start
with the facts that I am the youngest of eight girls. No brothers just
sisters. Although my sisters did marry so I do have brothers-in-law. :o)
My father died when I was seven so I really don't have many memories of
him. I was raised by my mother, my grandfather and my seven older sisters.
My grandfather died when I was twelve and I still do have many good
memories of time spent with him.
We were Irish-Catholic but my mother never referred to us that way. She
always said we were "Americans". When I was young I thought she
was very stern. I used to ask her why she was always angry. She said
she wasn't but she sure looked it. I guess it was because she held
full responsibility for raising the last half of her children alone.
That sure was a handful before the days of automatic appliances and
frozen foods. Before McDonalds and Burger King. Days when the woman
stayed in the kitchen cause she had to prepare all the meals, serve
them and clean up after everyone. Sadly when she died in 1993 my
mother became the child and her children became the adults. I still
miss her so much.
My sisters are a book in themselves. The four older ones were so much
different from the four younger ones. The older ones seem very jealous
of each other, constantly trying to take control and must always be
right about everything. I think they look at life in black and white
without any shades of grey. (LOL I am sure to get heck for printing
this about them.) The younger four are not like that. Each
of us is similar yet different. We laugh most times at the older ones.
We are not competitive and accept each other for who we are with all
our faults and we do have those!
Although over twenty years ago we lost one of us. One of the four older
sisters suffered
a massive cerebral hemmorrage and went into a coma never to survive. I
watched my mother's heart break as she buried her daughter all the
while she was comforting her grandchildren. My sister was survived by
five children four of which were girls and her youngest a boy. Today
sadly there are only three of those girls and the boy alive. They lost
their sister, my neice, at a young adult age. She in turn left two
children. The strangest part of all that is my sister and her daughter
had the same name and both of them are gone.
I suppose when you are part of a large family there are those you lose
through the years and it seems as though you spend a lot of time at
funerals. We have buried several brothers-in-law and each one is
missed to this day. Sure, some were closer to me than others and one
was very special. I miss him almost as much as I miss my mother. I
even called his mother nana. He was like a father to me and I held
him with such high regard that I gave my only son his name.
Which brings me to the family I have with my husband. I met my husband
quite by accident one evening even though we grew up in the same area
and his mother knew mine. Funny how things happen. Anyway I have
listed everyone so you can pick and choose or use the Site Menu to
continue on to another topic.
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