Once Removed

 It pains me not to be there. This is the kind of thing that my mother lived for. This is the kind of thing that made her full: a gathering of the clan. 

We heard stories of how little Barbara grew up an only child. We listened to those stories about growing up behind the drug store in Granby. Her devoted parents doing all they could to take care of her and bring her those things that they believed she needed. 

She had those and more. She wasn't an only child. She was part of a family that was so big that it would fill a mountain cabin and the meadow below it. I know this because she took pictures of it all and each year the guest book for the Johnson Family Picnic ebbed and flowed, but Barbara was right there in the middle, telling stories and singing songs, and making sure everyone had a place. These were her people. This was her family. Aunts and uncles. In-laws and out-laws. And all those cousins. For so many years, I tried to track who the Reeds were, who the Millers were, and how all these different names connected to the family tree. 

My mother knew. She could recite them for me. Long before she was a Caven, she was a Johnson, and she knew the line. She was never happier than when she was in the midst of it all, part of a great expanse of connected a tribe. The ones she held so dear. 

It has been a long time since we all got together. Elda and Lloyd. May and Kenneth. Marv and Dorothy. It never occurred to me way back then that my mother's name would be part of the list of those remembered. 

But we will. And we do. Because that was the gift she gave us: a place to gather and to share our common bond. And our love for one another. Raise a glass, Cold Duck if you care to, and toast the memory of Barbara Caven, who lived a life that she shared with us all.

And we've got the pictures to prove it.