Monday, August 02, 2004

My kooky cousin and the bacon eating jewish boy

Well the reunion went great this weekend! My dad and I arrived and of course we didn't recognize anyone, so we asked if we had the right reunion and they confirmed that we did. I then was directed to my second cousin who had invited us. After saying hello and what not, he got everyone's attention and introduced me and told everyone of my family research and then turned to me and said, "The floor is yours". OMG! I could have just crawled under a rock, I was so mortified.

I started off by saying that I was a horrible public speaker. Then I started explaining about how are great grandfather and his sisters had immigrated here from Germany, and started showing pictures and such. Well that really got the ball rolling, there were several old timers that helped fill in a lot. Like how my great grandfather disowned my grandfather for getting my grandmother pregnate before they were married and that my great grandfather had done the same thing with our great grandmother (getting her pregnate before they got married, that is). Then the big reveal that great grandma was actually Jewish and not German.

While we were all getting to know each other and gossiping about family ancestors, this slim woman with wavy blonde hair and glasses (similar to the old cat eye style) came up with her arms full of stuff. She then announced, "Hey everyone, Look what I got at the yard sale across the street." She then pulled out these two old vintage dresses, one looked as if it had been a cocktail dress and was gold with pleats that ran at a diagonal. She then introduced herself as my second cousin Jeanie and told me that she had gone to school with my youngest sister. Then a little while later, I heard Jeanie say, "Hey you guys, Look at me". Jeanie had pulled the gold cocktail dress on over her clothes and was modeling it for everyone and doing a little dance to boot. Everyone laughed and Jeanie said, "someone take my picture". Then her mom (who is a family historian also) said, "my kids are such clowns". Jeanie then looked at me and winked, and I couldn't help but smile and laugh along with everyone else.

For the rest of the weekend (and probably for the rest of my life) when I thought of Jeanie in that dress, I would get this goofy smile on my face and know that I'm home.


Today my Doctor's nurse called to tell me that all my labs came back normal. Yea! That's good to know since I haven't been taking my afternoon meds for the last month, just morning and night meds. She also said that my liver is normal also. Double Yea! But that my cholesterol is high, 142 when it should be under 130 and that the Dr. wants me to lower it through diet. DIET, why can't I just take another pill to lower it, so I can eat what I want Dammit. Oh well so much for the half a package of bacon that I normally eat on the weekend.

Funny how I find out that I'm part Jewish and that I can't eat bacon anymore (or at least not as much) in the matter of a few days.

No comments: