RAYMO’S RAMBLINGS -FAMILY REUNIONS
FAMILY REUNIONS
Do you like family reunions? I do. I attended a small family reunion last weekend at my brothers in Worthington. It seemed like all my extended family reads my blogs each week. I was shocked and appreciated the nice comments about my blogging. My cousins were wondering if I was going to write about them in my blog this week. The answer is yes!
It seems like family reunions don’t happen as often as they did in the 50’s or 60’s, which is really sad. When I was a young child, it seemed like my parents were always going to family reunions on the weekends. Big gatherings in city parks, picnic tables were full of food all day. I remember playing baseball, or kickball with all my cousins, uncles and aunts. Even grandpa and grandma played with us. Many pictures were taken. It was always fun.
In fact, when Neal Armstrong stepped off the lunar module on the moon on July 20th 1969 we were at a family reunion in New Richland Minnesota. My dad and I left the reunion to go sit in the car in the parking lot to listen to the first man to walk on the moon on the radio. I was twelve years old. It was my mom’s side of the family, the yearly Crumb reunion.
I like getting together with family members I don’t get to see often. I spent a lot of time with my cousins as kids growing up. We were always together. We really had so much fun running in the yard, wrestling, fighting, teasing each other, eating, and someone was always crying because they got hurt. I never cried.
When my brother Greg and I got together with our cousins, Mike and Mark, who are brothers, all we did was tag team wrestle, we would literally beat the crap out of each other. There was always blood spilled. Looking back on that, it is amazing nobody really got hurt bad. It was so much fun, great memories with them.
Then life happens and you get older and go your own ways and don’t see them often. Sometimes years go by without seeing or visiting with them. So when we do a planned get together, I get excited to spend time with them for a few days. Which we did at my brother Greg’s in Worthington. Many stories are told of the old days, lots of laughs all day long.
Picture taking is a huge undertaking at family reunions. We all were taking pictures with our cell phones last weekend. Years ago, it was the Polaroid camera, or a Bell Howell 8-millimeter camera. My cousins Pam and Deb did a great job of organizing the family pictures at Greg’s, making sure we got each family unit. Pam did mention let’s get a picture of the young generation, they wouldn’t let me in that picture.
I also enjoy spending time with the younger generation which would be my nephews and nieces and their children. I must admit I don’t know all the names of their children, but they are sure cute kids. I’m sure my uncles and aunt said that about me when I was that age. Family reunions are fun and I hope we do more of them.
