How Did I Start Out at This Train Station?

I have always been fascinated by how generations of people I never knew have had a fairly profound effect on who I am. The personalities and choices of people from decades ago with several greats in front of the word grandparents started the mold for what became me—both genetically and experientially. As their characteristics and results of their decisions were passed to their children, a trickledown effect had a hand in how my own parents parented, lived, and what their values were. I hope sharing some of this information will be interesting to my children and grandchildren.

I can only address back to great grandparents as some stories were relayed to me. My maternal great-grandparents were apparently quite a mismatch (as both my husband’s and my parents also were in many ways). She (Mother Gee)was a very hard worker and, I understand, very religious. He (Daddy Gee) was also a hard worker, but stories that have carried on through the years are more about his jovial nature and heavy drinking. He was Irish, after all (McGee). It turns out that he had a horse that would carry him home and stop for him to get back on any time he fell off. This horse later became the property of my dad’s uncle (Daddy Gee and Uncle Bernie were buddies), and my dad had commented on what a good horse this was for them as kids to learn to ride because of his training with my Daddy Gee. This seemed sort of a funny story to me, but my Mam Maw (Daddy Gee’s daughter) did not think it was very funny. She added that he would often take her mother’s butter and egg money to buy drinks for others. Negative family stories were not freely shared, but I became aware that Mother Gee had apparently been admitted to a mental facility toward the end of her life. I think my Mam Maw sort of blamed her dad, but others talked about her symptoms being more like extreme menopause. Back then, any behavioral concerns from older adults was called hardening of the arteries. I never met her, but do have a memory at about 4 or 5 years old of Daddy Gee unshaven, old, and in a big iron bed and then later attending his funeral.

To be continued………