Me, Keith and Wayne
Once again I am playing catchup on my blog postings. This one should have been posted before I left Fort Myers because it was that last weekend before leaving that I traveled up to the Tampa Bay area – specifically, to Valrico, FL – to see my cousin Wayne and his wife, Patty. As an added attraction, another cousin, Keith, would be stopping by on his way back from a golf trip to Texas. This would be a mini-reunion with my closest cousins. I have other cousins, some older, some younger, but Wayne and Keith are the two who are closest to me in age. Wayne is the oldest, but is just four months older than me. Keith is the youngest, but is just four months younger than me. When my parents traveled to Ripon, WI, to see my father’s family, I almost always got to spend time with Wayne and Keith. Some of my most vivid childhood memories involve Wayne and Keith and the time I spent visiting their dairy farms:
- feeding the chickens and collecting the eggs
- watching a chicken get slaughtered (and, yes, it does run around with its head cut off)
- milking the cows (usually by machine, but, a few times, just for fun, by hand)
- feeding the pigs
- playing in the hay mow (aka hayloft, but we always called it the hay mow)
- visiting a maple sugar operation in the woods
- baling hay (and lifting those heavy bales into place in the mow)
- riding on the tractor
- eating sweet peas fresh off the vine (I don’t like cooked peas, but I love the fresh ones)
- spending days and some nights – in the deep Wisconsin winter – in farmhouses with no indoor plumbing
- taking a boat ride on Big Green Lake
- knocking over the refrigerator on New Year’s Eve when the parents were out
Happy times.
I hadn’t seen Wayne in 11 years, since my mother’s 80th birthday celebration. And Keith… I can’t remember the last time I saw him, but it was almost certainly over 25 years ago.
Wayne and Patty were quite the hosts, in their vacation house in Valrico (very nice!). Besides Wayne and me, my cousin Carol – Wayne’s sister – and her husband were there and also another couple from Ripon that knew my parents. It was a long trip, but well worth it. Good food, too.
BTW, Patty looked fabulous. If she hadn’t told me I would never have guessed that she is over 65. Whatever you are doing, Patty, it is working.
One of the big surprises, after tying to make contact with Wayne and/or Keith for months, was that Keith was living in Cape Coral, about 20 miles from the Seminole Campground. So for 4 months I had been a hop, skip and jump away and didn’t know it.
To make up for lost time, Jett and I met Keith and his girlfriend Debbie (Debby?) at Red’s Fresh Seafood House in Cape Coral on the Thursday before our departure. Debbie (colloquially known as “Debbie 2” to distinguish her from Keith’s similarly-named ex-wife) was charming. Jett, who frequently reminds me that she doesn’t like people, liked Debbie a lot. We had a great time and Keith paid. Thanks, Keith.
Wayne and Patty are still uncertain whether they will be retiring to Valrico or how much time they will spend there each winter. Keith, however, loves Cape Coral and has no plans to go anywhere else. If Jett and I get back there for another winter, I hope we get to see all of them more frequently.
They are still my favorite cousins.