finally friday, i think . . .

some of my family

i cannot believe i've gone almost an entire week without blogging. not like me at all. while i keep a handwritten journal, i also like to keep this one as a way to connect and make online friends. i don't have a huge reader following, in fact it is quite dismal in numbers, but in spirit it is far greater. i am so appreciative of the readers i have. i like my readers very much.

family. i have started reading "the kennedy women" this week. it's about 1000 pages and begins with bridget kennedy coming from ireland. i am hooked on it. i'm on about page 175, so i have long to go before completing it, but i am loving the history. i am so, in some small fashion, even embracing my own irish history. you see my paternal grandmother, mary kelley, immigrated from ireland in the late 1800's aboard a ship bringing her to a new life in america. wow. i don't know that i have the strength of nature to do what these women did. my family didn't fair as well as the kennedy's managed to, but a family they were nonetheless.

my father was the 2nd of 15 children born to my grandmaother. not close to her at all. in fact, after she divorced my grandfather she promptly dropped her children at an orphanage in southern california and fled to begin her own new life in california. that is as much as i really have ever cared to know about her or her life for a long long time. then a few years ago i was in minneapolis, at the mall of america, with my oldest son dylan and there was a native american dance performance happening in the center. i sat and watched for the longest time and dylan and i began talking about our own family traditions and history. at the time i was also taking a french cooking class and diong all things french, as i had been raised to do by my very french mother and her family. dylan questioned why i never explored the irish side of my self, and my only response was that i didn't consider myself irish only french. i am french.

one only need took at me to see i am very irish. i am a big boned pheasant stock girl. i am not the petite slim girl that all my sisters are. while they are, all five of them, 5'2 ands under, and a mere 85-100lbs, i am a stocky 5'7 130lbs. they like to refer to me as the amazon woman in the family. i am the exact replica of my paternal grandmother, even bearing the same name. i have since, that conversation with dylan, developed a keen interest in all things irish and i am slowly coming to grips with the fact that i am not only of french heritage, but of irish too. and it's not bad. i think it is the french in me that often times makes me cringe at knowing something else has worked it's way into my blood flow. but it is good.

one of the aspects of this kennedy book i am enjoying is the closeness of the family. family is everything. we are six girls, and for the most part we are close. sticking together through it all. we are constance, jennifer, marileigh (me), laura, shannon, kathyn. laura and i are merely nine months apart in age. irish twins as we are called. we are all blondes, and while most have blue eyes, i have green and shannon has brown. we share clothes, we share make-up, we share our lives together. we also get mad and don't speak. laura and kathy were so mad one time they didn't speak for seven years, finally making up with our father passed. how sad to let one small disagreement keep you apart from those you love.

shannon is my very best friend. her children and my children are close to each other. their other cousins they are not so close to, but they would be for them if the need were to arise. family is important to us.

speaking of family, i think i need to call shannon.