My Second Loopiest Aunt called.

Spiky Bugger · May 6, 2024

She now lives in Northern CA. She asked if I could take a photo of the house she lived in here in SoCal. I said, “Sure. What’s the address?”

Well…see…she didn’t study for THAT part of the test. But if I looked up her neighbor David, he still lives in the same house from long ago.

After a few tries, she remembered that David was her neighbor from NoCal.

I texted her daughter to see if she remembered the address. She said she did not and since her mother NEVER gave out her address…even to the store that sold her a washer and dryer and needed the street address to deliver them.…she might have trouble finding it.

But she’d look.

She is my final BUFFER GENERATION person on my father’s side. The last of ten kids born to my grandparents, she’s now 90 years old. When she’s gone, I become the BUFFER GENERATION.

And the beat goes on…

southernlady · May 7, 2024

Spiky Bugger said:
She is my final BUFFER GENERATION person on my father’s side. The last of ten kids born to my grandparents, she’s now 90 years old. When she’s gone, I become the BUFFER GENERATION.

And the beat goes on…

When my uncle passes, I’ll become the buffer generation. He’s 90 this year. Other than AFib, he’s in good health. He’s the youngest of the four sons my paternal grandparents had. I’m the oldest child of generation below that. They actually had five kids but the oldest only lived one day.

Spiky Bugger · May 7, 2024

southernlady said:
When my uncle passes, I’ll become the buffer generation. He’s 90 this year. Other than AFib, he’s in good health. He’s the youngest of the four sons my paternal grandparents had. I’m the oldest child of generation below that. They actually had five kids but the oldest only lived one day.

One of my cousins, Kenny, a few months older than I, was in a taxi, hit by a train and died when we were seven. [The others got out…but he was the third passenger, back seat, passenger side. In those days, only the taxi driver could open the doors, so that passengers didn’t bolt without paying. Driver got out and opened the back seat door on driver’s side and everyone who COULD get out ran. But taxi doors that can’t open are illegal now. After that, I’ve always been terrified of trains and train tracks. Unless I’m ON the train. I kind of wonder if those other kids…their parents set up taxi to and from Catholic School so the kids didn’t have to cross the tracks on foot, most moms didn’t have cars back then…ever got over that moment.]

My (step-parent-adopted) cousin Jim (we got him when I was 8 and he was 12) died a few years ago. Cirrhosis.

My last older cousin, Fred, the only PRE-WWII cousin. complained of the worst headache ever and died the next morning…brain aneurysm.

So now, I’m it. Judy was younger and died. Susan was younger and died. Mostly girls now except for Wayne and Don," and then Patti, Nancy, Christine, Charlene, Lauri, Diane. We are not as rowdy as we used to be!

southernlady · May 8, 2024

On my Mother’s side, I have older cousins. My Mother was the #5 of 6 kids, 3 boys and three girls. I only knew of 2 boys til after her death. Apparently a month before her birth, she had an older brother die riding a motorcycle. She never mentioned him, my father never knew about him. The only way I found out was it was mentioned in an ancestry entry and I asked my aunt, her younger sister, about it and she confirmed it.

Spiky Bugger · May 8, 2024

People are so strange. The (surviving) daughter of my Second Loopiest Aunt called one day to ask how to find a copy of her parents’ marriage certificate, for conservatorship purposes.
Me: Your mom won’t tell you?
Cousin: She doesn’t remember.
Me: Have you MET your mother? [“Blatantly on the spectrum,” as we say, with times, dates and numbers up front.]. I can get it for you and call you back. By the way, what’s YOUR date of birth?
Cousin: December [something of whatever year.]

Five minutes later:

Me: May [something of whatever year.]. Your parents married seven months before you were born. THAT’S why your mom “can’t remember” this one very important day in her life.
Cousin: That explains ALL THE RULES we had about dating!!