Cousin's...

I'm sitting here reflecting on the past 30 hours. My aunt (my mom's sister) turned 60 today, so my mom, Travis, and I came down for the dinner 'festivities.' My cousin Kathleen is going through a divorce, and she and her four girls (between the ages of 4-10...yikes!) live with my aunt. We spent the day with them today. My mom is staying at my other aunt's house, so I didn't see her until we got to the restaurant this evening. There were more cousin's, aunts, and uncles there. None of them I'm remotely close to, nor ever was. One of the cousins (from my moms generation) had to introduce me to her daughter, saying that her other daughter and I used to play together. Uhhhhhh...o.k. If you say so!! Don't remember any of them!

My cousin's David and Daniel came with their s.o./wife and family. My cousin Tammy came with her two oldest (one by birth, the other by marriage...she has two more at home...I think she might be crazy!)

Growing up, Tammy is the one I new the most. She was always at my grandma's (cuz mostly she and my aunt lived with my grandma). David, Kathleen, and Daniel lived in Arizona for most of the kid years. By the time I was a teen-ager, I went to live with my dad so I didn't come to this neck of the woods often. But to me, these four are my cousins. I'm the oldest, by 6 years. It tickles my funny bone to think of how nicely they have all grown up! Not like I'm THAT old! But what I miss, and am afraid I can't duplicate due to the logistics of it all (we're currently 3 1/2 hours, by car, from home) is reconnecting with my cousins AND letting Travis grow up knowing HIS cousins. Something that I should work on. Daniel has a step-son that is almost Travis' age. They are a 3+ hour drive from us too (they live in Salinas) but perhaps we should make some attempt to meet them some place. The thought of getting together actually seems filled with obstacles. Maybe we need to just have the boys stay in touch via e-mail. Tammy's son-by-birth as well as her stepson are same age as Travis too. Trouble there is that I've met her husband, and he sure didn't impress me. Gads, this is going to sound SO stuck up, and I don't mean it in a bad way, but really the only thing Tammy and I have in common is our childhood 'history' at family get-togethers. She and her husband are in a COMPLETELY different socio-economic place. Greg and her husband would have N.O.T.H.I.N.G. in common.

These truly ARE random thoughts! It's highly likely that I'll go home and get back into my routine, and it will be YEARS again before I gather with my cousins. But then those of our parents generation are getting older. We need to gather more often for birthdays and good times. Being the oldest, I think I need to see what I can do to make that happen.