still burnin

last day in Goshen. We went to my aunt Diane's house for a change of scenery. That and I'd never seen it since she married Mike. Nice place. They've got 2 kids now who are fun as can be. Mike's one of those man's man types, rides bikes and hunts big animals to mount them on the walls, drives two big trucks and has a bike track in his yard. You'd never guess it talking to him though, he's soft-spoken and hilarious. They just bought their oldest (he's 5) a honda 70, which he's more than ecstatic about. And who can blame him? Dad = cool, dad rides bikes, bikes = cool. He'd only had it a couple days though, and managed to put a nice scrape in our van while we weren't looking. He wasn't hurt at all, but it sure scared the life outta the poor kid.

Since whitney fit that little 70 we let her ride it. Neither her nor I had ever even sat on a bike much less driven one, we had to get a crash course from our dad, who used to ride many years ago. Whit took to it pretty quickly, so of course I couldn't let her get away with doing something I hadn't done. Mike got out his 250, which while I fit on, I found a bit too peppy for this newbie's skill. But ride it I did, and while I never quite got the catch of changing gears (you clutch with your hands?) I found it enjoyable enough. I'm not about to run down to Cycle Barn and pick out Yammy instead of a car, but I could at least see the fun in it. My uncle managed to wreck his life with a bike so they don't have a real good reputation in my family. I'm a big fan of bikes as a form of transportation (efficient, high gas mileage, opitimum for single person) but sadly you have to share the road with those damn SUVs, so there's enough saftey issues IMHO to make them impractical as a commuter vehicle. In a perfect world....

Anyway last night was interesting and today is probably less so. Our way home consists of 3 short days, 5 hours apiece. First stop: Boise (say Boy-see). This change in direction also heralds a change in family sides, Boise has my mother's cousin and the next stop, Kennewick, has her aunt. It's amazing the difference between the extented families - you'd be surprised how much there is to talk about when your extentded family barely gets along, and how much different stuff there is to talk about when they are in agreement. I mean, don't get me wrong, there's a lot I like about my father's entire family, but it seems the adage about large families of kids- that you can disagree with 3 siblings and still find someone to play with - has not changed as they've grown up. Grandma does lots of head-nodding and mouth-shutting about her kids and the things they do nowadays. Granted, with 12 kids from 2 marriages, you're probably ensured a few strange ones. I probably only notice because that's never been the case with my mom's family. All good German Lutheran immigrant stock, them. Far too civilized to voice disagreement. And you know, I could probably blame a lot of it on my dad's father Leonard. He... wasn't a great dad. That's about the limit of my knowledge but I think I'm ok with that. What is it the bible says about sins of the fathers? Third and fourth generations will be cursed, but the blessings of fathers extend to a thousand generations. Something like that. I can happily say that I have been on the latter side. It seems to me that cycle was broken in my family, at least for me and my sister. Sadly, it also looks like we're the only ones. Most of our aunts have suffered divorces at one time or another, not to say that they're not happy now, but it seems it took them some trys to get the marriage thing to work.
In my experience there's no such thing as luck. My life I shall call blessed.