That got me thinking about some other great quotes I've heard lately from people in my life. Before I get into this, let me say that I spent the weekend in Virginia, celebrating my Grandpa's 85th birthday. He is my only grandparent left, and I love him! My parents were there, and my sweet sister, and our cousins, aunts and uncles, his rakish friend Peter, and our favorite family friend, Lisa Mirabelli. (Some folks are SO fantastic and powerful that the first and last name must always be used.) Lisa, if you read this, we adore you, and wish we could cook you shrimp and grits and cake for dessert every night!
A note about my Grandpa- he loves handmade pottery, and Bill O'Reilly, and wildflowers, and had his first poem published a couple years ago in his college's alumni journal. He loves driving but dislikes flying, and is a retired geologist. For the last handful of decades years he has gone swimming 3 days a week, and he is in damn good shape. And he loved my Grandma Alice, whom we called Nanny, for 55 years. We all love and miss her still.
Also, I got to see my sister's magical, imperfect life, complete with pocket pals, farm kitties, cool housemates and crazy thrift stores. And there was her budding new community, Whisper Hill Farm where she's found her people, and the little Charlottesville Farmer's Market, where she slings coffee and kale. I tried to set her up on a date with a cute guy who worked in the liquor store with toothless Judy, where I went to buy bourbon for whiskey pie. If you are a cute young farmhand in the Shenandoah Valley, I have a sister for you!
But I digress.
Actually, I would like to digress again. The humor in me writing a post all about anxiety while on a family trip hit me like a load of Xanax once I got back to Austin. This is how it works- you love these people, and you let all your shit hang out, and then you write in your blog about it. To the Noble's and Newman's- there aren't a lot of us, but we are high quality characters, I'll give us that.
So, on to the quotes.
There is an old saying of our Grandpa's, "If you're nervous, go to bed!" Seriously good advice.
Also, when as a small child we would yell at our parents, "I HATE YOU!" they would calmly say, "Well, that's your prerogative." That's what happens when you're raised by a social worker and a sensitive Jew.
Steven gave me bluebonnet seeds for valentine's day last year, and they bloomed again this year! Only one plant came back, but it's bursting with flowers. He looked at it thoughtfully and said, "you know Lindsey, it's not the number of bluebonnets you have, it's the size that counts."
He has also been known to say, "Every time you put ketchup on a hamburger, Texas cries a little."
I promised my sister that my dying words will be to grab a grandchild and yell, "Your great aunt shit in my yard!" (It's a long story.)
My Dad had a raging party with his best friend that's he known for 40 years, whose name is Doug McChesney. Apparently the two person party culminated with him saying to Doug, "Next year- Burning Man, Mark and Doug naked in the desert."
Totally something Theodore Roosevelt might have said.
Just to bring it back around to what we were talking about earlier, the morning I flew out my Grandpa and I were talking about coffee. He brews it extra strong when the Seattle relatives come to town. He laughed as he was doing it and said to me, "You know sugar, for me coffee was never some big thing. Just warm water that makes you shit. And that's fine by me."
Amen. Here's to you, Grandpa, and a life well lived.
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