Falling Far From The Tree

My favorite Aunt e-mailed me the other day ... and I found myself feeling sad. We don't keep in touch very often even though she lives right here in town. There's never been any bad blood between us. She just has her life ... and I have mine.

I love her e-mails ... partially because she closes each one by reminding me that I'm her favorite. That always makes me smile because I'm sure she says the same thing to my cousins. That's alright though ... I bet she's their favorite too.

But in any case, when I read that message, it brought back a memory about one of my other aunts ... and if I don't write it down, I'll be up all night thinking about it. Sorry ... sometimes a blog makes a great sponge ... soaking up all that mental flotsam and jetsam.

So ... one of my mom's other sisters had a daughter. We'll change her name and call her Suzie ... to protect the innocent. Suzie, God love her, was so sheltered and babied as a child that she was emotionally stunted and unable to interact with people like a normal human being.

As you may guess as you read this, I've got a little bitterness over this aspect of my childhood ... mainly because I, as a normal child, was considered to be either a tom boy or a bully because I liked to run around and play ... while Suzie was considered this shy, delicate flower because she sat on the sidewalk and literally cried if she walked more than ten feet from her front door. No one, apparently, at the time had the foresight to realize this type of behavior did not mean she was precious and delicate ... it meant she was a psycho.

While I was a regular kid who liked to wear jeans and t-shirts and hang out in tree houses, my cousin Suzie was called a "genius." They assumed she had to be because she was so introspective, quiet, and backwards. While I wanted to go climb their tree in the front yard, she wanted to sit and read a book alone. My Aunt considered this to be a sign of her enormous mental and educational potential. Meanwhile, I looked at her and said, "She's nine and reading a freaking Dr. Suess book ... she's not a genius ... she's a moron." Don't even bother asking ... I got two weeks for that outburst.

In any case, she was the wunderkind, right? One time our families were supposed to go to the public pool together. It was just me, her, and our two mothers. We drove over to their house and I came dressed with my bathing suit under my cloths. When we got there, Suzie was getting ready to change. Her Mom told her to go put her swim suit on under her cloths so we could go. We stood there waiting.

Ten minutes later, she came out of the bathroom, dressed in her cute little shorts and baby doll tee ... with her swim suit on top of them. She stood there like a deer in headlights and said, "I'm confused ..." I rolled on the floor laughing my ass off. You betcha ... grounded again.

So don't ask me Hank
Why do you drink?
Why do you roll smoke?
Why must you live out the songs you wrote?
Stop and think it over
Try and put yourself in my unique position
If I get stoned and sing all night long
It's a family tradition

Hank Williams, Jr. - Family Tradition