Today, May 20th, 2019, Sally and I will be attending a private ceremony to say a final farewell to my last remaining Aunt. The wife of my Father’s brother. As I lie awake in the early morning waiting for the sun to rise, my thoughts gather from the darkness of times and people gone by. In remembering my Aunt Ila from family visits and gatherings, my thoughts rummage through my childhood and settle in on times spent at my Grandparents acreage. I have vivid memories of the smells coffee percolating on the stove, of pipe tobacco and cigar smoke, of the basement where they kept their eggs and fresh milk. All of which congers up memories of sitting at their kitchen table with my cousins and coloring in well used coloring books and arguing over the use of crayons that had seen better days.
My mind has been drifting through the past on that very fast, slow train of time where you speed from one memory to the next without stopping long enough to become emotional but still leaving one sad for not trying to spend more time with those who are now gone. How many questions does one have of those that can no longe give you the answers that you seek. How I miss those Christmas gatherings at Grandma and Grandpa Thoensen’s house, the family all tucked into their basement with all of those fresh farm smell and the food and tobacco smoke, the fresh creamy butter, and everyone talking.
The passing of my Aunt has given me cause to revisit my family in a way that I have not done for many years, not even my mother’s passing created such an interest. Maybe because she is the last of that family generation, maybe because life goes on, not slowing down for any of us. For those of us that are the aunts, the uncles, the parents and the grandparents, we have bought our ticket on that fast, slow train and as it moves forward is seems to be moving at an incredible speed. It’s only the stations along the way that give us those incredible memories. If only we could pass our memories on to the next generation………..wouldn’t that be wonderful.