My Mom gave me a gift certificate for Ancestry.com. I've been looking up friends' ancestry left and right, and ordering all kinds a cool copies of records for folks.
Kendall is from Ireland (did the red hair and name give it away?); Chippy is Old-School Brit; Marie is Czechoslavakian.... and Me?
I am - wait for it - Bohemian. Bohemian! Does this shock anyone? No, no it does not. I am so thrilled I can dismiss any responsibility for my actions to: Dude, I am a BOHEMIAN. I have no modern-day morality. Now if I can work in paganism I AM GOLDEN.
That said, my father's family is a different story. My Dad never speaks of his father, and as well he wouldn't. My grandfather was a cruel, abusive drunk who beat his wife and eventually his kids.
I met him once when I was little. He gave me a fifty-cent piece.
When off from working the railroad, he played minor league baseball, a catcher. He never made it to The Show. Not because of lack of talent but because he couldn't stay sober. And that's saying something for back in The Day, when no one cared if you were a sot. Often he was so drunk during games he could barely get out of the crouch - but in the heat of the game, no one got past him at home plate, no pop up was missed. He was hands down one of the best minor league players in Texas.
I wonder who he would have been, had he been able to put down the bottle.
If anyone, maybe a man who did not beat his son, my father.
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