Time to wake up! It’s the day my brother and I meet our dad’s dad’s brother and his family (my great uncle).  My dad wakes up first, which is no surprise since at home he wakes up at 1:30am every morning to head to work at Boeing (he’s a workaholic and works about twelve hours a day, apparently it runs in the family).  As he’s up and in the shower at 6am (which for us is really 4am Pacific time), I am waking up and checking my phone for any text messages or e-mails?, score – my sweet, sweet boyfriend has sent me an e-mail telling me how much he misses me (everybody together now – ahhhh), with a picture attached, my day is now complete.  My dad finally gets out of the bathroom at 7am (because I knocked on the door needing to use the potty), he was reading the bible, not wanting to wake us up with the light.  I quickly shower, get dressed, blow dry my bangs and start putting on my minimal amount of makeup (eye liner, blush – because I look deathly without it, and mascara) while my brother hops in the shower.

 

My stomach growls… guess it is breakfast time.  We walk down the stairs to our nice little continental breakfast that includes an assortment of eggs, biscuits, gravy, sausages, bananas, donuts (chocolate, powered and a crunchy coconut one), oatmeal, waffles, toast, bagels, cereal, coffee², tea, hot cocoa, milk, juice and water.  I choose to eat two pieces of cinnamon raisin toast, a banana, and of course coffee while my dad and brother eat eggs, a banana, donuts and orange juice.  Excited to meet our great uncle, we decide it is time to finally head out.

 

The weatherman predicts thunder storms all weekend, and nicer weather when we leave (of course, and even worse Seattle is actually hot and sunny this weekend).  Our drive to McKinley’s³ (my dad’s uncle, our great uncle) in Bradford was only about thirty minutes away from our hotel (not too shabby).  Bradford is a small town of about eight hundred people, mostly belonging to our family tree.  We even have a road named after us (where my great, great, great, great, great grandparents first lived), and a park that is actually named after McKinley, because he was mayor there for twenty five years.  Bradford is a farming town, so there are not a lot of shops, there is however a Valero gas station, which they refer to as a “quick check” and a rather large grocery store for such a small town.  Did I mention the post office?  It is probably the nicest place in town, much too big for this little country place.

 

About three minutes from McKinley’s we see the street sign with our last name on it!  So of course my brother, dad and I had to get out and take pictures by it.  After our crazy posing with the sign, we headed down the long curvy road that was at first paved, then gravel to McKinley’s place.  McKinley lives on a farm with several cows, an aging dog that herds the cows and a towering over, about to fall down, barn that sits right behind his cute little house.   As soon as we pulled into his driveway, he came out side with a huge smile on his face excited to meet us.  He gave my dad a handshake (my dad’s side of the family doesn’t know what the word affection means), my brother went over, introduced himself, and refused the handshake and instead offered a hug (which McKinley kindly took), and then I introduced myself and gave him a hug as well.  He looked at my brother and I and said (to my brother) “I thought you’d be a little shorter4” and to me, “and I pictured you much taller than that5.” 

 

McKinley was so excited to have us around that he wanted to show us all about the town and our ancestors in Bradford.  Every other house in Bradford was some sort of relative6.  McKinley was the governor of Bradford for twenty five years and during his time he had made Bradford a better place to live.  The town recognized that and built a park and a ball field and named it after him (except now that he’s not in office, the place has turned into a dump, and you can occasionally find drugs and needles scattered around the park).  McKinley even showed us the trailer park in town that used to be nice, but once the fires came (I guess in the summer time they have crazy wild fires, well some set on purpose, but most on accident), they were all destroyed7.  McKinley then took us to the cemeteries and showed us where most of our family was buried.  It was weird to see the plots already marked out and bought for people who are not even dead yet.  McKinley had bought four plots for him and his three children (one of which who just died last year from cancer, she was in her 40’s, and was his youngest child).  We got to see where our grandpa was buried (he sadly committed suicide in the late 70’s before my brother and I were born).   It was sad to see all those graves, but even worse to see my dad in tears remembering back when his father died and the pain of not having him around anymore to see his children (my brother and I) grow up.  My dad is not fully alone though, he has seven brothers and sisters (although six now, because the second to youngest who was named after my grandfather had also committed suicide in the early 80’s, he was only 17).

 

McKinley and I were both starting to get hungry, so we decided to head out to Sonic and grab some lunch.  My dad was about to pay for all of our food when McKinley reached out, grabbed his wallet and paid the $27.13.  He told my dad that Washington money is no good in Arkansas, we all laughed.

 

We got back to McKinley’s he showed us around his farm, which was about one mile squared (although we did not walk around the whole property).  My brother and I went up into the leaning barn (I was afraid one wrong move and I would fall through the floor boards).  There were a lot of bees’ nests up there, so we decided to climb down.  It was getting cold outside, so McKinley thought we should go inside and chat while we waited for dinner.  He showed us videos of his grandson playing baseball and football (I fell asleep, oops).  He is a very proud grandpa. 

 

About two hours later we all decided it was time to eat.  My dad, before we even left to Arkansas, was bragging about the catfish, so they decided to take my brother and I to Tadpole’s Catfish buffet.  I am not a huge fish fan, but I tried a piece of catfish (fried and breaded, of course).  It tasted like chicken at first, until I got to the middle which was juicy and then I could taste the fish.  Buffets are not my favorite place to eat.  The fact that the food has been sitting out for long periods of time, many people have picked at it and people always over eat are just a few reasons why I am not a fan of buffets.  We finish up, McKinley tries to steal the bill, but my dad catches him and we go up to pay.  The waitresses at the buffet had on these cute shirts and my dad saw me eyeing them and bought me one for a souvenir, how sweet. 

 

We head back to McKinley’s say goodnight and head back to our hotel.  I am happy to have met McKinley.

 

 

?Thank you iphone!

²I LOVE coffee.  I worked at Starbucks for three years, and I am debating going back, just for the free coffee.

³I am now going to name my first son’s middle name after him; he’s a very, very hip, witty, quick (especially for almost 80), down to earth, sweet, honest man.

4My brother is 6’6

5 Ouch! I’m 5’6, but because my whole family is unbelievably tall, I look like the short one (minus my maternal grandma who is 5’2).  My mom blames it on my coffee addiction starting at 3 years old (thanks nana).

6I can now see why people in the south slept with their cousins and brother and sisters, etc.  That’s all there is.  Probably about 200 of the 300 kids that went to school in Bradford were related (to us).

7Yet people still lived in them anyway, wtf?!