Aunt Janice & Uncle Ken

• 1/2 can mhl - home
  
• 1 bottle Sam Adams Oktoberfest - HR Rectory

Tonight I visited with my aunt and uncle from Oakdale, California. They are heading out on a cruise tomorrow morning and were able to spend time with us...my aunt has been out since Saturday however, so I've seen her off and on throughout the week. I always have great memories of Aunt Janice and Uncle Ken. One of my earliest is when Michelle, Ken, and I (and mom and dad) visited them in Stockton one Christmas (this was back in the 70's) and we all slept in cousin Steven's (now goes by Steve) bedroom and we kept waking up and running to the living room to see if Santa had made his visit. The parents kept telling us "Go back to sleep!", but of course, we just couldn't. [I don't think cousin Andrea was born yet, but maybe she was a baby.]

They are all special to me for a few reasons: Andrea and Steven are the only cousins that we visited regularly (I've never met my cousins on my dad's side) as children, and, Janice is my mom's younger sister. There is no real resemblence between them (I leave that to my sister who is, now, more than ever, a ringer for my mom - both personality-wise and look-wise), but the fact that she is my mom's sister is special to me. Mom and Janice were very close to each other too, sharing many personal things. When Janice found out that our baby's name was London, she immediately thought that maybe that's where Susan and I conceived him (not true), and she said that if my mom had done that, Ken's and Michelle's names would be Hughson and Hughson. (Hughson is where her dad lived and we'd go to visit often). So I know there were many personal things shared. It's stories like these that I cherish hearing.

I can only guess that my mom and Janice were close because they were closer in age to each other than their youngest sister, Becky. I forget how much younger Becky was than the two of them, but it might have been around six years, which isn't much, except that Janice and Ken were married when they were 19, and Becky would've been 13 and my mom was 23, so in those terms, it's a big difference. Unfortunately Becky is in a psychiatric hospital and I haven't heard from, or about, her in years. She used to play with me when I was a baby though and I still have pictures of Becky as a young girl holding me.

A few years ago Janice and Ken invited us to their time share in Maui. It was a great time and they showed us my grandfather's, and great-grandfather's burial site. I also saw the house where my mom lived the first few years of her life. Even though Janice was born in Centralia (another coincidence), Maui holds a special place in her heart and they vacation there every year. I've only been to Maui twice, but I feel a connection to my mom when I'm there. It's where she began life and I like to imagine her as a baby sitting in her mom's arms in the hot, humid Hawaii'an sun with her dad and her grandmother, dressed in muumuus, sitting under palm trees, cooling themselves in the salty breeze.

Janice and Ken live in Oakdale, California, which is the only other place in the US where there is a Hershey Chocolate plant. We used to tour it as kids. Janice told me however that it is no longer the chocolate plant and some other company purchased it. I was sad to hear this! Driving to Oakdale, you drive through miles and miles of orchards; the air is dry and the land is arid. Every once in a while you might catch a whiff of a turnip factory, and do they ever stink! I like to think of it as Steinbeck country, but I'm not exactly accurate by saying that. There are many fresh fruit stands along the way and it's always fun to stop and get a couple of treats. At my mom's funeral, Uncle Ken talked about how my mom used to drive those dusty back roads through the orchards at top speed, scaring her passengers - he was terrified to ride with her - ...she didn't do it on purpose, that's just the way she drove. I like to think of her flooring that pedal and kicking up the dust as the orange groves blurred by.

Saying goodbye to AJ & UK is never easy...they're all I have left of my mom's family. The memories I have of cousins Steven and Andrea, of sisters Yvonne and Janice, of Ken and Michelle....