The True Story of My Life #5 (Family History)

Where did I come from?

On my father's side, there is a long line-up of teachers and professors, and musicians. My father's grandfather taught violin at the George Washington University in Virginia (W. Virginia?) with only an 8th grade education, he was so good.

My father's father was a forest ranger for a time, and then a high school teacher for History and Art, and track coach. He and my Dad shared a love for History and exchanged books and jokes. My father was skipped ahead 1 or 2 grades after he was tested and his I.Q. was in the highly gifted/almost genius range. I've known my father to be able to do anything he put his mind to. He can build buildings and do all the electrical work himself; He plays music by ear and has directed choirs and written music; and when he was younger he painted, what I hear, were beautiful murals on walls. He once tested extremely high in spatial/analytical skills for a job with Willamette Industries and was told no one had tested higher or turned in the results so fast. He had an interest in psychology, architecture, and archeology, as well as theology, but when he became a christian, at age 18, he went to a Lutheran Seminary. He was promptly, I think, kicked out for being a practical joker. He also did very well at track, holding records in Soap Lake for decades, and that was when he didn't practice and was only in it because his Dad was a coach; he smoked weed when he was out of sight. His Dad, my grandpa, served during WWII and never spoke of it. He always had a dog he loved, and liked living close to nature in a cabin, and had a trout pond and did a lot of fishing. His first wife was my biological grandmother, who was a former student of his class and very bright, but thought he was taking her into the big city instead of the woods, and his second wife is the grandma I know best: Rosella Parra (?), whose family is Mexican-American and has been in the U.S. a long time. My grandfather's third wife was Malaysian and he met her as a pen pal. Grandpa Garrett used to say, "I like my women the way I like my coffee--hot and black."

On both sides of my family there is an interest in animals. My father doesn't hunt and is always observing things with binoculars. On my mother's side, the men in the family tend towards carpentry, farming, contracting, and business. Her father was valedictorian of his class, and went into business with two of his brothers, planting fruit orchards in Wenatchee, Washington. My mother's father's father had a degree in agriculture from a University. My mother's mother dropped out of University after meeting my grandfather. Her father was a contractor from Luxembourg and he spoke Luxembourgish in the home. Her mother was mainly Scottish and loved to play piano and dance and be social. She warned my grandmother, "Don't ever marry a german!" as her husband didn't talk much. My mother's mother's mother was a bit artistic and sentimental. She wrote songs and had a pet refugee at her home--people in the area would bring their injured animals and birds to her and she nursed them back to health. My grandmother, my mother's mother, also wrote poetry, mainly comical satire. My grandmother was drop dead gorgeous when she was younger, frequently being stopped on the street and asked if she was a movie star. She wore fresh flowers in her platinum-golden blond hair which was double thick and fell to her waist, and she had "gams" other women envied. She wore red lipstick and little other make-up.

Everyone, on both sides of my family, is pretty religious. Mainly conservative Christian and a couple of Catholic believers. There were no divorces until recently, and then only one, and it was because of an abuse situation. No one really has had experience with the justice system, or the law, or lawyers. No one ever really needed it, except for business. So in a sense, my family is comprised of church-going people who are not very worldly or in tune with the politics of courts and class. We are a trustworthy lot, in general, and I think have believed everyone else must think as we do, and abides by certain morals and standards. Most of the people in my family have no qualms with conformity, and will do whatever is required to fit in or appear "appropriate". This makes it difficult for them to understand me, and their lack of insight about how hostile or deceitful others can be, makes it difficult to believe anything is ever as bad as it is, or that what happened to me hasn't usually been my fault. In our family, we tend to trust others with licenses, badges, degrees, and other credentials. We're all do-it-yourself entrepreunerial types, but I know my family has far too much faith in the system, as I did, until I was in the middle of it firsthand.

Ancestors? I'm told we're related to some Garrett family in England that once had a castle, to several Civil War officers, George Washington through my father and Abe Lincoln through my mother, Lady Godiva, and I can't remember who else now. There is a little Native American heritage, and on my father's side, the Cherokee we are descended from are from a group who disobeyed the order to march down the Trail of Tears, and ran off to make a living, in hiding, in the hills of West Virginia.

Forgot to write a bit about my mom, and brother, and what they're like and what they do and how we're different, but I'll come back to this post. This and the last post aren't really good writing, I don't think. Too choppy and disjointed, with a grocery list flavor. I was sort of cramming in stuff without winding into it as usual. Maybe it's because I wrote out framework for chapters...instead of just going with the flow and writing what comes to mind next. It's less fluid when I try to adhere to structure, I think...but as for timeline, I meant to go from talking about buying my house and working in a business, back to my childhood. The hook was in the hostage situation hint. I figured I could cram in childhood crap first ...I want to add my teen years, but I think it's time for hostage situation--this is what people want. They always want to know every detail about being held hostage. I'm the drama queen? or are we all drama queens? men too.

Totally tangental, I was thinking queen, and then king, and then about the FBI situation too, when it first began and how they took me to Burger King, and how I was just there a week ago, with a "friend", getting some grub for everyone at the house. We were talking about the FBI thing and he joked he was undercover and had a bug or ear on him and at the speaker menu he turned to me, asked me what I wanted, and then said, "And what does the FBI want?" I said promptly: "Crowns." There was silence and I repeated, "Paper crowns..." and laughed and he said, to himself, "paper crowns..."

Kinda true, huh! I'd like to have a photo of me with a paper crown that says "666" on it, and then a team of FBI people behind me with Burger King crowns on, holding up certificates of acheivement.

We're all drama queens.