My Aunt Marge

I got a call from my Aunt Marge the other day, telling me that she was having surgery this coming Friday. She is my mother's younger (and only surviving) sister, and has suffered from a hiatal hernia for a long time. They are operating on her to "take care of" this condition. I worried at little as I talked to her, because she could not stop coughing. She said that the coughing is caused by the hernia, but as a layperson, I don't know the slightest thing about that condition and hope that the doctors are right. However, they also told her that she has a mass on her right lung. She asked if it was cancerous, and they told her "If it was cancer, it would have killed you by now." The doctors' flippant answer did nothing to assuade my fears. Aunt Marge is 70 years old, and although she seems strong, she's had 2 strokes, and that's serious enough for anyone.

As is always the case, our conversations go on and on. She tells me about things that happened a long time ago, how it was when she grew up, and the early life of my family as she remembers it. It has been my pleasure and my honor to know her, even though we didn't grow close until after my mother died. I regret that I haven't had enough time to know her better, and haven't kept in touch with her children. Her oldest daughter, Daphne, and I used to write letters back and forth when we were teenagers. She's one of the sweetest people in the world. I reconnected with her at my Uncle Dick's funeral last year, and it was wonderful to see her. She looks exactly the same as she did when she was young. I wonder how it was, growing up without her extended family, and know that my own sons must know that better than I. Her paternal grandmother told Aunt Marge years ago that she didn't want anything to do with her granddaughters. What a horrible thing to say! Even in the worst of circumstances, I cannot imagine a grandmother saying such a thing.

Even though Aunt Marge told me about the things of her past, there is such a big gap there. She went through so much... and much of it I did not know about until the other day when she called. I didn't know, for example, that when she was being abused by her father and his new wife, she ran away to Ohio to be with Aunt Flo (another of her sisters). The police came, and both Aunt Flo and Uncle Walter told Marge that she had to go back. She did, but ran away again before she was 18, lived with a girlfriend, and then joined the Navy. I had no idea. I had heard snippets here and there from my mother, but nothing like this.

Aunt Marge got married and had two daughters from her first husband. When she found her husband had a girlfriend on the side, she left him. He never even touched his second child, Krystle. He never picked her up. Marge said "here's your daughter", but he just looked at the baby on the bed. I can't imagine how he could do that. I guess he got it from his mother. They divorced, and she met and married my Uncle Fred. They had two sons. Thank God she got out of that first marriage and into a good second one.

In the course of our conversation, I told Aunt Marge what I had written about and the reactions of my birth family and their "friends". She said unreservedly, "I believe you". She went on to tell me about how my father had tried the same thing with her when she was a teenager, and she told him that "You are married to my sister, and if you don't stop it, I will tell her!" God bless her for telling me.

She has been through so much in her life. I certainly hope that she makes it through her surgery all right. She has her doubts, but I will be praying for her, as I know the rest of her family will and hope for the best. I love you, Aunt Marge!

Nazdrovie'

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