Ode to an Aunt…

Memories of riding in the back of your green van. You speaking Latin with the boys. Lots of laughter. Oh the boys who taught me so much, who I’ve always loved. I used to think the boys were crazy. And they were. They were alive and free. Hanging out with Nathan, trudging through woods, swamps, oceans. I remember catching a duck with a fishing pole. Continuously failing to catch a frog. They were always too fast. Looking under rocks for salamanders. Which were never there. I had never seen one at that point, I didn’t even know what one looked like, but there I was looking for it because of you and all that you had taught Nathan.

Your family was a whirlwind of life. You filled me with knowledge of this world. You taught me to see shooting stars on the small sand beach of Camp of the Woods. You taught me what a shark tooth looked like in the beautiful beaches of Siesta Keys, Florida. You taught me that heat lightening was just lightening farther away. You taught me how to look for fossils in a Rocky River bed.

I remember when you laughed with me when I fell on my head because I thought there was a back to the seat of a canoe. I was mad at Nathan who was mad at me for not paddling the canoe right. So I’d quit and tried to sit back…. Do you remember?

On a different trip I laughed at Uncle Tony when he fell out of the canoe because he was trying to move one of the boys... probably for not paddling right. :)

When I was with your family I was truly free to be me. Even as a kid that’s a place that is hard to find.

My most recent memory with you was at Grandmas. You were showing us something on the computer. I have no idea what we were looking at. I think we were just waiting for it to load on that old dial up connection. But I remember laughing, laughing so hard.

I remember saying that you were my role model as a kid. And looking back at all the memories I have, it makes sense that you are. I always admired you for being a doctor, even as a kid I knew that was a big deal. And now I’m all grown up I still think it’s a big deal! But now I can see the other things that you’ve done to effect the lives of the people around you; of your sons and nieces. I hope that I can make my kids (if I have them or nieces, or nephews or students or...someone) see the earth the same way you showed me its seemingly small but wondrous beauty.

This letter has been a long time coming,

I hope it reaches you from across with world with sincerity.

I love you, Aunt Susan. Glad to be in contact on that old facebook. Sending good thoughts from across the world... :)