Sunday, September 2, 2012

Hank, the Little Old Ladies, and Family Reunions

My husband is a brave man!

Last Sunday, Hank picked up his mother at "the home" and took her back to Hometown for a family reunion. Being the brave man that he is, he decided to carry her to church and to transport "Miss" Peggy, who celebrated her 90th birthday two weeks ago, around too.

It's an hour drive from here to the home and another hour from the home to Hometown. By the time he got Miss Peggy loaded up from her house and made it to the church...the country church that both little old ladies have attended all their lives...they were late. Now hang with me here...

The music director, Gator (he has a real  name but I don't know what it is...have only ever heard him called Gator) was at the podium announcing a hymn. As Hank's merry little band walked in, Hank's mother HOLLERED from the back of the sanctuary, "Hey there Gator!!"  to which I am told he replied, "Hey there Betty!!!" then went back on about his business.

So...the service continued and seeing as it was the end of summer and new Sunday School classes were about to start up, it was incumbent upon the superintendent of Sunday School, Mr. Clary Mole to give a report and hand out awards for perfect attendance and so forth. It got to be about a quarter to twelve and he was 30 minutes into his part of the service and seemed to have no intention of wrapping things up...and the preacher hadn't even read the scripture yet, much less started the sermon AND the family reunion started at 12:30 at the Shrine Club clear back to town and around the other side. Miss Peggy started to get twitchy. She does NOT like to be late to family reunions. SO she sat up straight and tall in the pew next to Hank and said...not softly...Doesn't he KNOW what TIME it IS?  Hank replied, "No ma'am, I don't think he does. Let's go on ahead over to the reunion." And they did. Hank reckoned that he really didn't have anything to lose at that point.

The reunion was enjoyable, except that for several years in a row now, Miss Peggy has just missed winning the prize for being the oldest person there. She's always a tiny bit disappointed, I think. Not that she wishes the one person older than her any ill...it just might be nice it that person stayed home one year. I mean, really, who doesn't like to win a prize?

3 comments:

  1. Oh my goodness, I am dying laughing. I'm just picturing the whole "Hey there Gator!" scene. I'm sure it put a smile on everyone's face!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Love it! We have few Gator's around here. I realize as I type this, the voice in my head has the same drawl it did as I read. Wonderfully Southern!! :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. This is a wonderful story. You should have it published somewhere. Out in California we don't even know life is still like this anywhere:). And we're happy it does.

    ReplyDelete

Please comment...it makes me HAPPY!