Perfect Day

The problem with having a day work out just like you expected - and even better - is that it's not half as much fun to talk about afterwards and to try to sort out too many pictures.  This may take more than 1 day.  Not that it's very exciting or even interesting to those outside the family, our revisiting old home places that are no more and visiting cemeteries where my grandmother and great-grandparents are buried.

A good bit of the day was spent just talking and remembering these people and places and marveling at how many, many years have passed since they were young people and parents raising their children and working on the farms.  It makes you aware of how quickly life passes.  We did have at least one discussion of what our headstones should say!  Or our urns.  We decided we might want to honor our children with our presence even after we die. 

It is nice that a good many of these relatives had nice long lives, most of them living into their 80s and at least into their 70s despite not having easy lives.  Even our great-grandmother Elizabeth who had 10 children in 15 years lived to be 77. 

So anyway, I'll get into that tomorrow after I talk to Sherry, the family geneologist, and sort through some of our questions.

I have to mention again how lovely it was just to drive on such a beautiful day, just soaking up the October sunshine and seeing pumpkins and haystacks and fall arrangements along the way. 

When I got to Debby's, Gus was excited to see me, although this pictures doesn't prove that.

I made the mistake of stepping out of the car into his territory, and he had to reclaim that before he could greet me properly.

We took time for a quick game of Fetch the Otter before we left and a few knee and ankle kisses.  I didn't wear his favorite shoes this time, so he lost interest in getting them off.  I took a few more pictures, but they're just blurs. 

Our first decision for the day was where to eat lunch, and we chose the first place we came to (not a hard decision):  David's Catfish.  It was nice and uncrowded, and we had a chance to catch up a little bit over our lunch baskets of fish or shrimp.  I never leave there without having cheese grits.  I meant to ask Debby if the waitress bringing us a fresh drink-to-go was a hint that we'd stayed too long or if that's something they do now.  A nice touch anyway.  We would need a little refreshment during the afternoon.

It seems most of the family lived on Antioch Road in Andalusia.  There were four different homes that we would visit when we were children, but only one of the original houses is still standing.  Debby and I remembered different things about different places, and since she's younger, I'll defer to her memory!  More about all that tomorrow.

This was a funny thing that Debby and I pondered over that Mama solved for us last night.  I knew there were twins in the family because I grew up hearing the names "Buddy and Sis" and knowing they were twins.  So when we came across these 2 people born the same year right next to my great aunt and uncle's markers, we figured that's who they were.

Except for the dates:

How could one twin be born in July and one in September?  We pondered over that a little bit.

It turns out they were husband and wife and they were the parents of those twins.  Daisy was not born a Dunn (Beasley, I think) and remarried an Ellis after Cleve died at a young age.