Today's Event: GREAT AUNTS
Participant Requirements: Be a great-aunt to Estelle and Léna
Be it Perron or Alexander, blood or marriage
(We don't care how you are a Great Aunt, we're like the Unitarian Universalists - we'll take anybody). (Sorry Lisa and Dan).
Tie for Super Duper Gold Medals are my dad's 2 living siblings. Treasures, both of them.
Above: Me and Aunt Becky in the middle of a crowd at Martha's. This is like hanging out with my Dad again, the same n0-nonsense attitude but with great perfume and fantastic nail polish. Sometimes she is so like him, it's enough to take your breath away.Below, Aunt Elaine in her West Glover farmhouse.
See that chocolate cake on the table. Oh you better believe she made that for us. She is over 80 and uses a walker, but she made us chocolate cake AND brownies. On a wood stove. She says things like "Aren't you a cunnin' little thing?" to the baby. Speaks like my father's mother.
Silver Medal Ties for a few lovely French Canadian gals = my mom's sisters. Aunt Yolande who enjoyed playing with our little butterball Léna.
And our other Silver Medal winner is one of my mom's other sisters, my Aunt Cecile Davignon (as in Sur le Pont).
Like a stage-coach inn, Cecile graciously hosted us for a few hours for coffee and blueberry muffins one snowy/raining morning, serving as a halfway meeting point so Martha could get me back to Lisa and back to NH so I could get back to Boston to get back to France. (an Olympic event in and of itself).
Bronze Medal Winners: My aunts who "married in", Carole and Marilyn Perron, wives to my mom's brothers Eddie and Rickie, who live up the road from Joan and Wes and with whom we enjoyed a Friday afternoon with tea and scones. It is amazing to think that they, plus Wes and Joan, all live on land that was originally all part of my grandfather's farm. It was a big farm!
We missed seeing all our other aunts, most notably Estelle's namesake Aunt Estelle. Here's a photo of us together from a previous (pre-Léna) visit:
A Posthumous Gold Medal goes to my Aunt Eleanor, sister to Becky and Elaine, from whom Léna gets her middle name. Here is a photo of us, the last time I saw her. Healthy, caring, and fixed me some crackin' egg salad sandwiches, served with a pickle. I sure do miss her voice.
Another Posthumuos Gold for my Aunt Pearl, ("married in"), just days after Eleanor. The Queen of Cabot, the lady knew cheese. She also knew just about every crazy expression that every existed - and used them in every sentence she spoke. A marvel. Here's a photo of the last time I saw her.
Not only do I always be sure to visit everyone I can when I go home, I always bring my camera. You never know when it might be the last visit, and I like to have a nice visual to accompany their voices in my memory.A bunch of great, great ladies - and Great Aunts!
