Kin folk

Sometimes I stop at the beauty shop my sister owns and she’ll be fixing some little old ladies hair, then she’ll say, “This is Aunt Ruby”… Or…”This is Aunt Opel”… Or …”This is cousin so and so”, and I usually have no idea who they are or how we’re kin. Not too long ago, when I popped in the beauty shop.. she said, “This is Cousin Betty”, Betty and I both looked at each other and burst out laughing. I had met Betty a few months earlier because she sat with one of my clients, we had no idea we were cousins. Now another cousin and I are trying to figure out how we’re cousins, we have it narrowed down to Aunt Mable (his grandma) and Momma Hazel (my grandma), but we’re not sure how they were kin. He said, maybe they were half sisters… Notice, he said, “MAYBE”.. In he doesn’t know for sure. However, that is highly possible because I remember my mom talking about her granddad; he was either married seven times or had seven different lady friends he kept company with. The story was, when one would get mad at him and kick him out of the house he would be seen going down the road to another lady friend’s house with all his stuff packed on his horses back. I think he bounced around between them. Hummm, now I’m going to have to find somebody old who remembers .. And find out just how many kids this grandpa had.

Back in the 90’s, a little old lady from momma Hazel’s side of the family (whom I didn’t know) passed away and my dad who was preaching the funeral said there might not be a lot of family and friends there because she had outlived most of them and it would be nice if I went since I was laid off and had all that free time on my hands. So, I went. When I got inside where all the family was waiting to be seated before the funeral, I didn’t see one person I knew. I was beginning to think I was at the wrong funeral then, Bill and Laverne Jones showed up.. I’m not sure how we’re kin to them either; I don’t even know which one we’re kin to.. But, I betcha it has something to do with my great grandpa.