Memorable days.....

“Those were the days, my friend,
we tho’t they’d never end......”

I’ve always said that time flies whether you have fun or not.....’n you don’t get do-overs......
T’day is November 29 ‘n I just heard that Cuzzin Richard died....his daughter, Tracy, called to tell me. He lived not too far from me but I hadn’t heard from him or spoken to him for about two years....I haven’t seen him in longer than that. Not my decision but his. He withdrew from the family a long time ago.
About three weeks ago, Reba Warnock Dameron died.
I guess she’d been sick for a little while but I hadn’t heard so it came as a shock. Reba ‘n I were close in high school and she was Richards first wife. Well, so far as she was concerned, she was his only wife but there were a couple more.
I tried to call him but got a disconnect ‘n didn’t know how to reach him.
Aunt Bill ‘n Uncle Fred lived down the street from us when we lived in Beattyville. ‘N for a few years, we were more like brothers than cousins. Roaming the alleys of Beattyville ‘n the riverbank or crawling around the honeysucle covered hills. He was a year ‘n a half older’n me, give or take, ‘n a year ahead of me in school. Bigger’n me but kind’a uncoordinated, we learned to swim at about the same time. Bob Dameron (older brother) was a good athlete (basketball mostly, where we grew up) and the coach eyed Richards height as we grew. I think he ended up about 6’2” but he couldn’t run....so the coach had him skipping rope. He got pretty good at that but if you ain’t got the eye hand thing naturally, you pretty much ain’t gonna get it.
Bob was a good athlete, a fighter. And popular. Richard was aloof, standoffish. Nobody picked on him because Bob would’a kicked their butt so he never had to fight like I did. Not that he couldn’t. He fought with me ‘n he was big enough that he could’a whipped me but he never did. Probably would have had to ‘cause I wouldn’t quit but Aunt Bill stopped it ‘n made me go home....in my teens I changed schools ‘n we didn’t much hang out t’gether after that.
He didn’t live very far from here, couple miles I guess ‘n I only heard from him once in a while, Xmas card mostly with no return address.....I always figured that some day he’d show up on my front porch ‘n decide that he wanted t’be part of the family again...would’a been alright with me.
I never expected him to die so soon or so suddenly. I never expected Reba to go so soon or suddenly either. Heck, maybe when I go, it’ll come as a surprise to me. I’d guess that wouldn’t be so bad.