I have done this before; I stray from “natural history” and
instead make “personal history” the topic.
That’s where this blog is heading.
“Tale of Two Cities” for I have planned two trips for the fall. One just completed was to see my much-missed
cousins in Portland OR and in a matter of weeks, I will go to see my much
missed grandchildren in Portland ME. How
lucky is that?!
When I am traveling, I try to pay attention to what I am
“witnessing”, loving the chance encounter with some local flora or fauna that
may be common to the area but is uncommon to me. Then that becomes my topic for any blog that
might be about that trip. But when I
thought about my 6 days in Oregon, I thought what I witnessed most, was love.
Love of siblings for one another, love of
parents for children, of grandparents for grandchildren and not that that is
unheard of, but having it all in one place, well it was just a wonderful thing
to witness.
These four cousins were a huge part of my childhood, even
though they always lived a distance away (my uncle was in the Army) we visited
each other enough that is was the next best thing to having surrogate sisters
and brothers. And even though all of us
are technically only ½ Italian, when together, there is so much loving, and
laughing,
hugging and wine drinking and general bonhomie that our Italian side
comes shining through. Leo Buscaglia
would be proud.
Along with this nurture, there was also nature. What is more beautiful to eyes that have
grown accustomed to beige, than a full onslaught of GREEN? Lush green grass with horses standing waist deep in their favorite food. 
Snow capped mountains, the Willamette Valley, rich from
glacial deposits with soil ½ mile thick in places, sporting orchards of
hazelnuts, fruit and vineyards touting the best Pinot Noir in the world.
A grand trip, a beautiful state, but again, the lasting impression is one of Love. Another favorite Bible verse of mine is “..we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses…” and so I was. I hope you are too.
Lucky you, and my husband's family, too - cousins don't run in mine. Neither of my parents had brothers or sisters, so the Five Beautiful Daughters had no cousins, no aunts and uncles. We're making it up in the next generation. Four of us have sons or daughters, and they are producing cousins in the next generation (all but three of the sons, one of whom turns 35 today). So send a birthday wish to Karl in CA!!
ReplyDeleteYou know, that was Haps story too, both parents only children, and so my kids had only a handful of cousins which always made me sad. And they were always far away. Now K is the only one with children so they too have to "rent a cousin. I do know how lucky I was, 2 sets of 4 children each and when we all got together on the cape their were 10 children, 6 adults and 3 dogs, all crammed into one tiny cottage and loving it! Grand memories. And so we feel just as close today,
ReplyDeleteHappy Birthday then Karl, from a mystery aunt!