365 Days of Impacts

How do I sum up Aunt Mary? Aunt Mary or “Mamie” as we all called her was my grandmother Wilna’s older sister. When Nana passed away, Aunt Mamie became our surrogate grandmother - she welcomed our family with open arms when we would come down to visit. She never had kids. But we were ALL her children. She was a cantankerous woman in her old age who was no nonsense. She was matter of fact, direct and did not beat around the bush. She was the oldest of all the siblings of my grandmother's generation. Aunt Mary LOVED her garden. I swear when I’m out in the yard, Aunt Mary is out there with me guiding me (along with MOM). She was a golfer - and I remember her going out golfing with us in her 80s - which blew my mind. She was always up for a challenge!   Aunt Mary left us all a little piece of her things when she passed on. I have a pair of king and queen chairs with a marble table. She allowed us to tell her what in her house we would like after she was gone. When Christ...

Aunt Bec -or ‘Rebecca” was sister to Aunt Mary, and also my grandmother Wilna. She was probably the most prim and proper of the three. Her husband was the Mayor of Athens, Alabama at one point. She was the eldest woman of the Alabama family that kept everyone in check. She was a southern baptist to the core and was very rooted in the church, and not just because her son was a baptist preacher. She was by nature very sweet. She lived a few blocks down from Nana on South Houston Street and a couple blocks up from Aunt Mary. I still have irises in my yard that have traveled from Oakhurst to Tucker to Oakridge with me. These Irises were on her street, and I will pass as many of them on to my bonus kids as possible. This house was the house all the siblings grew up in. It had been in the family a long time. Now George Allen and Patsy live in it. They will likely pass it on to their kids. Aunt Bec and I were polar opposites as far as our personalities, what we stood for and who ...