Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Dinnertime!

(Click on photo to enlarge.)

I'm 16 in this picture and am half cut off over to the left. I notice I'm pretending to drink coffee - the mark of an adult as far as I was concerned. My grandpa had passed on at this point and my grandma is old and crippled by arthritis. That's her there in the front with her walker. I notice, though, that she still has a cheery smile on her face. I think she's amused by my bratty little sister goofing around across the table. Also in attendance (clockwise from left) my cousin  Janet Jo and sister Shirley, my Uncle John Roy, Uncle Charles and Rhoda (an older woman hired to care for my grandma). I think Aunt Lorena is taking the picture. Where are my mom and dad?

So what are we having to eat? Yum. I see fried chicken and mashed potatoes, bread and green onions. I can't quite identify anything else but am especially curious about the dark stuff in small bowls by eveyone's place. I notice there's ketchup and cow's milk, as we used to call it. 

This is a sad picture of my Uncle Roy for me. He's older now and his face is closed off, his eyes sort of vacant and staring. So different from some of his younger pictures when there was still hope for him to have a normal life. I want to speak to him across the table and the years. What would I say?