family ride.

the day of christine's funeral was an interesting day. my dad told me stories from his childhood that i had never heard before. i always enjoy those and appreciate them so much, especially when they're coming directly from him.

he laughed at the funeral whenever david cornsilk asked how our family knew christine. (we found out that david's father and christine were half brother and sister. they had the same mother but different fathers. i never dreamed david and christine were related). my dad just laughed at the question and didn't say much. when we got in the car later, he said, "i should have just told david how we were related. that would have really done him in" and started to laugh again. of course, i had to inquire ... and so the story goes ...

when my dad was young, and was the only child left in the home, his mother, maxine, ran off with a man named sam johnson. she and sam took my dad to the bank, forced him to clean out his account (which included a large settlement he had from an accident) and drank their way across the country. sam was never much of a provider, and the type who would work a job for a few days in order to earn a paycheck. the check would be gone before the time he got home, though, because he would spend it on alcohol and little else. after about a year of this, my dad moved home to be with his dad, truman.

upon arriving back at my grandpa truman's, (and here my dad started laughing), he found out that christine and truman were now an item. christine was the wife of sam johnson -- the man with whom my mamaw maxine had left town! my dad said that it started out innocently enough. my grandpa felt bad for christine being alone with her two children, and would go over to check on her and help out when he could. their relationship grew and developed, and my grandpa found himself very much in love with her. he asked her multiple times to marry him, but she never would. he always said, "i'm not living in sam's house, and she won't leave it."

for a few years, he distanced himself from christine, and married another cherokee woman named mary. mary was very, very softspoken and hated to spend much time out of the home. my grandpa loved to go to gospel singings, but mary hated to go ... so he would go with christine. mary didn't put up with that for long, and my grandpa and she divorced. from that time on, he and christine were always in a relationship and looked out for one another along life's road.

it is sad to me that i now have no remaining grandparents on my dad's side. i'm grateful for these types of stories. while it would be easy to be embarrassed by them (my grandmother's behavior especially), i know that i will cherish this glimpse into my family's history.