Reunions

Well, folks, it's time for me to live in the past for a while. The Brumback reunion is tomorrow at noonish, at the Ruritan Club in Mt. Eden. For those of you who don't know (and those who have forgotten), my granny, Attie Dennie, was a Brumback before she married Add Tincher. That was a pretty cool combination of names, Addie and Attie. She had three sisters, Blanche, Stella, and Mattie Ann. She also had a bunch of brothers, one named Marshall, and three or four others.

As to the next generation Brumbacks, there is Ruth from Aunt Stella's family, Roger and Glenn from Aunt Matt's family, and nobody from Aunt Blanche and Granny's family. Aunt Blanche had one daughter, Helen, deceased, and two granddaughters, Wilma and Wanda, who more than likely won't be there. Granny Tincher had a slew of children--Harvey (father of Pat and Marshall--not looking for them to be there), Jim (father of Jimmy, Joe, and Louie--all dead), Josephine (mother of Joanne--she won't be there), Florence (mother of Libby--she says she's coming),Ed (father of Lena (dead), Linda, Lolly, and Little Eddie--Linda says she is coming), and Anna May (mother of me and Mike--I'm going, I guess, but not Mike). Now you know about all you need to know about the family tree.

We used to have these reunions in Cherokee Park, at Big Rock in the Beargrass Creek. Those were fun times. They were always on Sundays, since folks used to work on Saturdays back then. My uncle Jess, Aunt Blanche's husband, would go to the park bright and early and stake out our area. They may have reserved it ahead of time. At our house, we would go to Sunday School. I would get to wear a skirt and shirt that day, not a dress, since we would be leaving as soon as SS was over. I would even sometimes wear my shorts under my skirt! Those of you who grew up wearing shorts to school cannot imagine the feeling of recklessness that went along with that! Right after Sunday School, we would pack up our stuff. We had an old Coca Cola cooler that Daddy would fill with ice. Mama would have fried chicken, orange ade, and my cousin Linda says she also brought corn pudding. I don't remember that, probably because I didn't eat it. I know I wanted to be in the front of the line, because my mama's chicken always went really quickly. A special treat were the bottles of pop that Uncle Ed brought--he managed a grocery store, and he always brought the soft drinks.

After the meal, we would get to wade in the creek. That was so much fun. It was considered dangerous, since rumor had it that a child had drowned there, but as long as there were a few adults with us, we could get in the water. And we were sort of taking a chance wading there, because up until then there was a very serious threat that we might possibly get polio from the creek--no one knew at that time what caused the disease, or how it was spread. My cousins Lena and Lolly both had polio. Lena was really crippled up from it,even spending some time in an iron lung, but Lolly got through pretty much unscathed.

Reunion day was really a special day. We didn't have to go to church that night, another treat. It was fun to watch the aunts be silly with each other. Aunt Matt and Aunt Jo loved to play around. Aunt Matt would do crazy things like wear two shoes that didn't match, just to be funny. When Everett was a baby, we took him to probably one of the last reunions at Cherokee Park. He had a pair of red jockey shorts (just for cute--he was still in diapers). Mama told me to put them on him, and to be sure to show them to Aunt Blanche, because she would get a kick out of them. She did, and that was probably one of the last times I saw her. She died the next spring.

Those were the good old days. I hope you are making memories for your children and significant others! Love you, and God bless.