I was checking out the gun section in Walmart with my two preteen grandkids. I wanted to give them time to browse, but my interest in guns slides deeply into the negative numbers, so I was searching for some entertainment. That’s when I spotted June and we began to chat. She was probably about my age, maybe a little younger, with glasses and iron gray hair that was pulled into an attempt at a bun. She was delighted by the children and this led down the conversational path to family.
“Are they twins?” she asked.
“No, they’re cousins, exactly a year apart to the day.”
“No kidding! I was born on my dad’s birthday.”
“Really? Did you have brothers and sisters?”
“Yes, there were seven of us – five brothers and a younger sister. I was the oldest.”
“You must have done a lot of caring for the younger ones.”
“I sure did. Especially after my father left us and my mother had to figure out some way to feed all of us.”
“Did you ever get back in touch with your dad?”
“No, he really didn’t want anything to do with us, and we felt the same way about him. I just helped my mom as much as I could. She was amazing. She actually went back to school and got her GED about the time I was finishing high school. One day the truant officer came to the house because I wasn’t in school. I told him that I was right where I needed to be, watching the younger ones so my mom could finish up.”
“You’ll never graduate on time”, he said.
“I looked him straight in the eye. ‘Watch me!’ I replied, and I did.”
Good for you, June! Your dad didn’t know what he was missing.
