A Tale Of A Different Kind

Good Morning Everyone,

 So this is my beautiful cousin Deborah Lucille Kelly... She passed yesterday morning at 4:47 am. Peace be with her and our family. There will not be a funeral. She is being Cremated in Dallas and her daughter will come back for her ashes and take her mama home with her out in West Texas.

 My Aunt had 8 kids. The older ones were pretty much grown by the time my Aunt started her second family as did my mom. So we all grew up together, the last 6 of us. 5 girls and 1 boy. It was me in born in 1959,My cousin Belinda in 1960. My sister Linda in 1961, My cousin Carl in 1962, My sister Susie in 1963 and my cousin Deborah in 1964. So Deborah was the baby of the 6 Muskateers. Carl being the only boy had to torment us girls...
 I would like to have posted a more recent picture of her, but the ones that we have now are not easy on the eye. Illness takes so much from you. This is Deborah in her younger years. About 12 years ago. She just turned 51 years old. So sad to know that she is gone, but at the same time, there is something to say about not living with earthly pain and illness.

 My cousin Belinda and I chatted for a long time last night. We were able to recall some memories that made us laugh, but for the most part our memories were bittersweet. We talked a little about our Grandmother and that was a little hard for me. My grandmother, (My fathers mother) was not a kind woman and she did not like me at all.
 When my mom was in a car accident in 1968 she came to care for us while mama was in the hospital.  I had just tuned 9 I think.
 My grandmother would get onto me and I begin to notice things that happened when she was mad. Pictures would suddenly fly off the wall or the crate that I was standing on doing dishes would fly out from under me. I don't remember the details but one day I flung my anger out at her. I never said a word but everything that I was feeling just flew out of me in a rage.
 She grabbed me by the arm and threw me into a chair and she said words that I didn't understand but she looked me in the eye and said.. "You remember little girl that I AM a stronger witch than you! When I told my family, like my older sister or my mom they would shrug it off and say that is not what she meant, but as I grew and started developing my own gifts, I knew exactly what she meant.
 The difference is she was a mean woman and I am nothing like her. I am the exact opposite and maybe she saw that in me when I was little and that is why she would do mean things to me. She knew I had good in me and would use what powers that I had for good. Not mean or ugly.

 When she died I took my mama and daddy to her funeral. I had not seen her since I was about 13 and I stayed away from her. I was in my early 20's when she died and I swear things was eerie at her funeral. First of all, the flowers, all of them looked wilted to me, not beautiful. The funeral hearse became lost going to the cemetery and we drove for over an hour before we finally arrived. Just as we got there the sky let loose with a horrible thunderstorm that prevented anyone from getting out of their cars, and in the end only a couple of the older cousins, my dad, aunt and uncles were the only ones who ventured out into the storm to the awning but were back rather quickly. Even more odd.... as soon as we left the cemetery the storm stopped. It was only a few years later that I really started recalling all of the odd things that happened.

 When my daddy was dying I was driving him back and forth to the VA Hospital and we stayed at my Cousins house. She showed me family albums that had pictures that should have been given to my dad. I asked for copies and she said No. If Grandma wanted you to have them she would have left them to you. Well there was only one picture that I really wanted and that was my mom and daddy's wedding picture. Mama lost almost all of our family pictures when our home was destroyed by a tornado so I really felt that she should have let me have that picture. It was an 8x10 but Barbara said no and that was the end of it.

 Daddy died in 1990. I had a blue oldsmobile. I had that car for several years. When I was pregnant with Laurie my husband started looking for us a station wagon. We didn't find one right away but right after daddy died in 1990 my husband and I found one that we liked. I had that car for quiet a while but when I got ready to sell it I was cleaning out my car. Now mind you, I had not been back to my cousins house or anywhere other than the VA Hospital. I had never gone back to my cousins house. And I had a different car then anyway. But as I was cleaning out the glove box, which I had cleaned several times and had kept all of my insurance information and etc in there locked. When I opened the glove box there was a small wallet size picture of my mom and dad, their wedding picture sitting on top of the papers in my glove box. I feel that my daddy somehow made sure that I had that picture.

I made copies of it for my mom. I still have it to this day, the original one I found in my glove box in 1997...........

 Some things that happen in our life cannot be explained. Some say fate, some say The Lord, some say that it was probably there all along (Which I know wasn't) and then some say, like me.... The power of good always over rides the intentions of meanness. What ever the case is....

 So I guess that this ends my tale of the past for at least today. You all have a blessed day always... BB