It's a Family Affair

mood: hot. so unbelievably hot. every bit of me cannot think of anything except about how hot it is right now.
music: Widow in the Window, GBS (not really, because now i'm back to that whole russian thing, but i listened to this on the drive back from maine and almost started crying. i don't think i've ever really listened to the words before, or something, but wow. it's beautiful, and so sad.)
random word: жарко

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So, remember in like January when we'd be walking back from the CFA or wherever, and we'd walk through McCullough just to warm up? I just did that, except for the opposite reason. I walked through McCullough because McCullough is air conditioned, and it is that hot out. It's disgusting.

Anyway, believe it or not I'm not going to write this whole post about how hot it is...although I could...cause it's really hot. I just got back from my weekend in Maine with my family. I think I mentioned this in a high and low or something, but my great-uncle passed away about a month ago, and the memorial service was this weekend, so the whole family got together. Bill, my great-uncle, was a truly amazing person. He and my great-aunt, Cal, who is still alive, were two of the most accepting, non-judgmental, genuinely nice people I have ever met. Bill was always joking around - at the service everyone was talking about the puns he always used. And Cal always looks you straight in the eye, with a smile on her face, and asks you in the softest, sweetest voice I've ever heard, how you are, how everything's going. Somehow she always knows or remembers what's going on in your life, and she's just wonderful. We never saw them a whole lot when I was younger, which makes me sad, but still they're just wonderful people.

Now, the interesting thing is that all of their children (my mom's cousins) are crazy. Ok, not crazy, but just...let me explain. There were four kids. The first was a gay, jazz musician in San Francisco in the 80's. He was supposedly really, really good, and my mom said she thinks we have a CD or some sheet music of his somewhere, which would be really cool to see/hear. Unfortunately, though, he died of AIDS when he was still pretty young. The next child has been married 3 times and has 4 kids. Her name is now Spirit Dove (she was born Nancy) and her current husband is Spirit Eagle. And one of her kids had a son at age 18, and possibly never finished high school. The next child has only one wife, and just 2 kids, but they are super crazy religious. Their children were homeschooled for a while, and they're the kind of people who can't say a sentence without it somehow involving God. However, they're also really really sweet, genuinely nice people. Their daughter, Rebecca, has a habit of writing on my facebook wall as if we're the best of friends, but she's super sweet, so I forgive her. The last child has been married twice, and when he married his second wife, he only had 1 kid, but seeing as she had 7 it kind of made it interesting. Some of those are adopted...I'm not sure how many. Then the two of them had a child together too.

Trust me, that was the short story, and if you got confused, just wait til I tell you the long story. Anyway, the family with all the adopted kids I had never met before; I hadn't seen Spirit Dove's family for probably 7 years or so; and, the super religious family I saw about 3 years ago. So we don't see them a whole lot. Anyway, as crazy as they all are, it was truly an amazing day. They had a ton of old photo albums out, and we watched a video from about 19 years ago when we were all together - it was Cal and Bill's 40th wedding anniversary, and they did this really cute little tap dance, and Spirit Dove wrote a song for them, it was a fun video. Somehow, I just got such a feeling of family while I was there. Maybe it had to do with the fact that there were so many people, all of them related to me or not really related to me in some different, crazy way, but they were all there, celebrating Bill's life, in a way. It was really wonderful.

The one thing that really got me was during the service when people went around and told any memories of Bill that they had. And Jenny, one of my second cousins, (so Bill was her grandfather) talked about how much in love Cal and Bill were, and how you could tell just by looking at them all the time. And the amazing thing about it was, as infrequently as I saw them, even I knew that and remembered that, and I'm pretty sure everyone else there did too. They got married in 1947, if I remember correctly, which means that they were married almost 60 years, and you could still see, when Bill just looked at Cal, how much in love he was with her. I think that if I can find that in my life, then I will be truly happy.

On a bit lighter note, I then drove back from Manchester, NH, which is where we stayed the night, on my own, which means I have a car on campus now! Hooray! AND I listened to Great Big Sea and Billy Joel and other NON-RUSSIAN music the whole drive back!! mwahahaha. AND in 4 days I'll be on my way down to the Lake House with Kyle to meet up with Dan, Becca and Kristen! As we say in Russian school, Oo-rah!!! Anyway, I'm going to go back to drowning in my own sweat...and possibly write a paper. Talk to you all soon!