My Great Aunt Edna

[bunchofgrapes]

I was talking with a co-worker friend this morning about Thanksgiving plans how we both like big family gatherings where relatives you only ever see at the holidays bring dishes of things you'd never otherwise eat - like mashed turnips and mincemeat pie. This got me to thinking about my Aunt Edna.



It took me a while to remember how she was related. She was my great grandfather's younger sister. My great grandfather passed away in 1970 and Aunt Edna's husband had to have passed away not long after because she was always at every holiday gathering alone. Well, not exactly alone. Aunt Edna didn't drive so she always came with my great grandmother. Aunt Edna was the epitome of 1960's. Early 1960's. She always wore a print dress a la Aunt Bee from the Andy Griffith Show, with stockings that rolled below the knee and those gray orthopedic shoes. She didn't have that boofy coif that grandma's tended to favor - hers was more like a page boy with bangs that I think she might have tried to curl. But she was always sporting those black and metal framed glasses that kine of resembled the Navy issue birth control glasses. At some point she had cat glasses but the black and metal frames always won out.

Aunt Edna, like most women who lived through the dust bowl and the depression, had a hard life. Her hands could probably rip a phone book, her ankles were thick as tree trunks, and her face was lined like an alligator purse. But she was a kind, quiet, proper woman who was always a fixture at the table with the rest of the women during every holiday gathering. I heard that she and her husband (cannot remember his name) worked a farm on an oil lease until he passed away and I think she might have even kept it going for a while after. To be honest I never really knew where she lived. She just appeared at every holiday gathering and mostly kept to herself.

I always looked forward to Thanksgiving the most because hey, what's not to love about a holiday centered on food? But mostly I loved it because Aunt Edna would bring the best deviled eggs I have ever had! She would also bring the pitted black olives that my cousins and I would put on the tips of our fingers and run around the house like alien frogs. And when we wanted more pie, she was always the one to tell us we were looking too thin and needed to fatten up a little. Aunt Edna never had kids so as I got older, I figured that's why she never really knew what to say to us - other than we needed to fatten up a little (and eventually we did). We weren't particularly close and I don't even remember when she passed away, but it's interesting that after she died, we stopped having the holiday gatherings. Everyone started doing their own thing for Thanksgiving and the holiday was never the same again.

Looking back, I'm grateful I grew up when I did. I'm grateful I had an Aunt Edna and a connection to what she represented, even if I didn't really appreciate it at the time. She was black and white in a world that was rapidly turning to color. She was the 40's, the 50's, and the 60's, all rolled into one sturdy, yet worn frame. There aren't any Aunt Edna's left in the world. They passed away many years ago. But the memories they left will always be some of my favorites.

Comments

[spottedhorse.livejournal.com]

Aunt Ednas were the product of a lifetime of hard times and unusual circumstances, something our generation hasn't really had... at least not like they did.
My great aunt was born in 1900 in a construction camp in rural Alabama. Her memories of her first home were of a tent. Eventually, they moved to the city and had a small house on the wrong side of the tracks. Still, she managed to grow into a petite fireball that was as gracious as any plantation bred Southern lady but had the grit of a pioneer.

Aunt Mattie divorced her first husband and charged through life with two children firmly attached to her skirt tails. She built a career in the Insurance industry (unheard of in her day), becoming one of the top agents in her area. She sent both kids to college because she saw that was where the future was headed. She lived through the Depression and for a divorcee with 2 children, did quite well.

Late in her 50's, she met the love of her life and they married a few years later. They "retired" to Georgia where they bought a peach orchard and became world famous for their peaches. Sadly, Will died ten years later, leaving her with the orchard. She kept running it well into her 80's.

I remember visiting at pickin' time and all of us plucking the precious crop from the trees. Every meal had peach something, whether it was a cobbler or ice cream or whatever else she could come up with. One Spring we were there when a late frost descended. This 85 year old woman was out all night, supervising us and the farm workers as we burned old tires to keep the orchard warm. Talk about true grit!

But the thing I remember most about Aunt Mattie is her shoes. Unless she was on the farm and wearing work boots, she always wore heels. I'm not talkin' one inch sensible heels; I'm talkin' high heels. None of her shoes were less than 2 inch heels! I've never been able to wear 2 inch heels. She did this well into her 90's until a stroke made walking in heels impossible and she compromised by wearing the more sensible one inch ones. She died at 101, still spunky and full of life til the end. And gracious as always, even in her last moments.

Nope, no more great aunts like Edna and Mattie around, for sure!

[vr-trakowski.livejournal.com]

What a lovely memory. I bet she'd be delighted that you remember her so. Thanks for sharing!