After receiving an email Christmas letter from a dear cousin, I was simply astounded at how very different, here in our 8th decade, we are.  I googled  “How close are first cousins?”

Lots came up, but this resonated.  “First cousins are as close as you can be and not be siblings. It means that the closest ancestor that two people have in common is a grandparent.” Actually, that would be two grandparents.

How much fun I remember having at my grandparents’ big rock house playing with this cousin.

We were such cute kids.  He is on our left here and I am on the right.  His older sisters are in between.

He looks full of mischief and I look positively angelic.  I believe our roles in that regard have had a reversal.

I do remember this telling incident.  We were playing around a big pile of rocks left from building the house, where we had been told to not play because of snakes.  Suddenly he yelled “Snake!”  I ran like crazy.  I asked him what kind of snake he had seen.  He said, “chicken snake.”  I asked how he knew it was a chicken snake. He told me it had three chicken feathers growing out of his head.  I’m pretty sure the only thing “chicken” there was me!

I saw him for the last time in 1984 at our grandfather’s funeral.

We do have this in common: “This year we have been blessed by God in some wonderful ways. We are still able to move around and do things.”  But that’s about it.

One of the contrasts that struck me the most was how his wife has dedicated herself this past year to “getting rid of” a lot of trees on their property and burning the branches.  The reasons for getting rid of a tree, unless it is huge and rotten and about to fall on your house or a power line, escapes me.  I continue to plant and nurture them.  When I first moved to 1880, the first thing I did was enlist Elizabeth’s help to plant a redwood.  I now live in the midst of a small grove.

This is the first one she planted.  It now towers above my three-story house:

Moving on.

In my mid-seventies, I do not need to be reminded about Jesus and I cannot imagine that I would presume to know more about him than others in my age group know or want to be instructed about.  I can’t think of anything more boring than being in a Sunday-school class where everyone is over sixty.  I do enjoy a class at my church of adults of all ages.

Unlike him, I have no interest in genealogy.  I love history, but for ancestry, I only care as far back as my great-grandparents, all of whom I knew.  Well, there is one exception.  An ancestor-buff friend did discover that I am a direct descendant of the last Choctaw chief, Mushulatubbee. I think that makes me an Indian Princess.

Unlike me, my cousins’ tribe continues to increase.  I am a bit jealous of that, but am so happy about the lives my three amazing daughters have chosen to live  A recent family gathering at 1880 included this jolly group:

Finally, I do not send Christmas cards or newsletters anymore.  I blog.

I do love hearing from my cousin.  Or possibly his wife.  I can’t tell for sure who is writing. I feel sure they would not approve of much about me.  As for me, I cherish diversity.