it comes in pints?

Back again

By popular demand. My Auntie:

Of course, she started out small:

That's my grandpa with her.

A little older. This is her with my mom and cousin Al. Auntie was a few years older.

A little older still, with Mom on the kitchen porch at the ranch. That shadow on the wall behind them - that dinner bell, used to call the ranch hands in the olden days, is still there:

Still older. Mom's on the left, Auntie's on the right, and a good friend, who I saw and hugged at the funeral, and who did a bit of travelling with Mom after Dad died, is in the middle. It's not quite like she was a third Mom, but she certainly counts as a sweet aunt and Class-One bullshitter (in the best way possible, and I love her to pieces):

You know, the current crop of "feminists" can bitch all they want about how women were consigned to the kitchen (barefoot and pregnant, of course) in the bad old days. God forbid a "womyn" should do something as manly as drive a frickin' tractor:

Or even do something so terrible as go hunting. This is my Auntie last deer season or possibly the one before:

BTW, that scope on the rifle was put on sometime in the last ten years, and only as a last ditch capitulation to aging eyesight. Before that, she wouldn't even use a peep sight. The sight on that Remington 740 was a filed-off buckhorn with nothing but a tiny notch left, but she could make a 200 yard neck shot better than most others with the best scope available. And she graciously allowed me to carry that rifle a few times (when I was younger, of course, as she would certainly allow her grandkids or grandnieces today).

Also BTW, she fought that fucking cancer for nine years. She and Mom went through chemotherapy about the same time (Mom passed about four years ago). Auntie went through more chemo later, but no goddamned cancer could keep her from killing an great buck. Gratuitous plug: go here if you haven't already.

That's all for now. I will post a little about the trip and the services later, possibly tonight if I hold up through the tears, otherwise soon.

It may have sounded like a throwaway line, but she truly was like a second Mom to me*. I love you, Auntie.

*This not only refers to being a strong influence and loving relative, but to how many times she whipped my butt for getting out of line when I visited. Roughly the same rate as my Mom. "Mi kid es su kid", as it were.

Posted by Ken S at September 20, 2006 07:10 PM | TrackBack (0) |