Mom was “Mama” to me, way into my teens. Last Tuesday was the anniversary of her passing four years ago. Cousin Ken Kauffman did some remembering with me this week as he read about the “Sandbox World” we played in as children. I didn’t know that Mama, his auntie, taught him some of the same things she showed us.
Ken says, ” I am reading it, and recognize everything you describe. This is interesting to me because we are about four years apart, and in childhood that is a large gap. I recall the sandbox, making roads, sand houses, fields, houses and twig fences, and I recall your mom being one of the grownups who showed us how to do those things. She also showed us how to make hollyhock princesses.”
Oh yes, the hollyhock princesses! Those flower dolls were so delicate and beautiful I don’t think we ever had them join us in our sandbox world: Did we? I think I took my flower families over to the grass, outside the sandbox, where they did well to last for an afternoon.
Moms who have nieces and nephews, are as blessed as the children who have the aunties, I’m sure. My Auntie Norma, Ken’s mom, was an executive aunt in my eyes, running a whole operation of farm family that was twice our number (at the time.) When she called me “Mackie,” as no one else did, I figured I counted, too, in her very busy life.
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