What's The Norm?

     Dad had four siblings, three older sisters and a younger brother. I am the youngest of this generation's children.  Being fifty SOMETHING for a while longer, I have many memories of the Fab Five.

     They always got together, several times a year, throughout their entire lives.  This being the case, all of their children, my cousins, knew each other from an early age.  

     There were times when one or two of Dad's sisters, usually the original Lela and Blanche, would take one, two, five or more of their nieces and nephews for the entire weekend.  We would spend those days at the cabin on the river or at one of their homes and there was never a lack of entertainment.  Sometimes we played cards, sometimes we fished and one time I remember we went hunting.  

     Lela's husband, Uncle Wally, was a back woodsman born in the wrong era.  He should have been best buds with Daniel Boone.  He took us out into the woods to go rabbit hunting.  There was a bit of snow on the ground, but we didn't care.  If you got to go someplace with Uncle Wally, it didn't matter where.  There we were, at least five of us, probably under the age of twelve, tromping through the woods with a man carrying a shotgun.  We were in heaven.  

     I can remember this event like it was yesterday.  I was wearing my older sister's coat, one she had left at the house while she was living on the other side of the planet.  A beautiful tan wool, double breasted, trench coat with a fur collar.  Uncle Wally would call out for us to stop, take the shot, and then I would pack the rabbit.  For some reason, when we got back to the house, Mother was not pleased with the blood stains all down the front of the coat.

     This was the family I grew up with.  A family that, even though they had their moments, got along with each other.  They are all gone now and I miss them.  I never knew that there were families that did not speak to each other.  I never knew kids whose parents were divorced.  I thought our family was normal.

     Then again, I grew up in a house with a galley style kitchen and a long kitchen table that was attached to the wall, a mother who always peeled fresh tomatoes and once threw a turkey carcass out the kitchen window.....who am I to say what's normal?