Remembering Aunt Connie

Here's Connie with her soldier husband

in front of the Durango Street house

in South Tacoma 1944

Here we are, starting another month. July was birthday month for my Dad and for Aunt Connie. She was born this day in Foley, Alabama in 1912. Had she lived another decade she would be 96 today. Connie was conceived when her father was 60, her mom 35. Twice impoverished by hurricanes, the family moved to SW Minnesota. Connie liked boys, but was frustrated. The local gals saw Connie and mom as the competition. Connie did manage to get engaged, but she broke the engagement. He couldn't keep his pants zipped.

Then came World War II. Her boy friend moved to California, so Connie followed along, ending up in Tacoma, Washington. She wrote my Dad and Aunt Olga about the better life on the Coast, so she's the reason we moved West. I remember Connie screaming "I'll never get married" in our house on South Durango Street. But she did, and had a couple of sons.

Aunt Connie liked to play with my mind.

Here's a classic Connie. She and her service man husband moved to Portland, Oregon. I was allowed to visit one summer. Connie had lots and lots of tomatoes. Many ended up on my plate. I ate what I could, as I have always been a good eater. But too much is too much so I dumped the rest out of the window of their second floor apartment.

Well, of course, tomotoes don't automatically occur in flower beds so someone ratted me out to Connie. I, of course knew I threw them out the window. And Connie knew it, too. But she wouldn't be satisfied until I admitted that I did it. Did I know how they got there? No, I did not know. You did it, didn't you? We kept it up, until I was forced to give in.

This is the same Connie who spanked me for not writing with my right hand, though I was born left handed. And the same Connie who conned me into killing the rabbits her family raised for food but couldn't kill because they had made pets out of them.

I could go on. Maybe later I will. But on this July 1st, I remember Connie.