Cousins

This is a story I wrote about four years ago titled "Cousins". Yesterday we said goodbye to my cousin Kent Geeslin and our cousin Mickey Ivy passed away several years ago, so I wanted to share this story with you again because it makes my heart feel better...

Cousins
By Terry Beck

Most all of us have cousins and to most of us cousins are someone special. Cousins are somewhere between best friends and brothers or sisters. We shared grandparents and the love we held for them. Because we share bloodlines, there is a certain inherent propensity for loyalty and trust for each other. Unlike friends, cousins are drawn together because of the bonds established by our grandparents, our mothers and our fathers. No matter what differences we have in our likes and dislikes, we are tied together by blood and by love. There is no such thing as secrets among cousins although there may be things that are not talked about out of respect and love.

I was indeed fortunate when it comes to cousins, I had loving cousins on both sides of the family. I was closer to my mother's side of the family simply because we spent more time together in Blanket, Texas, the home of my maternal grandparents, just fourteen miles from my hometown of Brownwood, Texas, as compared to my paternal grandparents and cousins, who lived in the Ft. Worth area, about two to three hours away.

Of course on my father's side of the family there were a lot of good times, romping and stomping with the cousins among the grapevines in Ma and Papa's back yard, marveling at Ma's substantial rock collection and there were always the family reunions....food, festivities and family. There are many fond memories of my Dad's side of the family, but probably one of the most meaningful involved my cousin Ronnie. I was young, my brother Danny was even younger and Ronnie was the oldest of the trio. We were walking in a park and Danny fell into a deep creek or ditch and could not swim. I remember Ronnie jumping into the water, grabbing Danny and handing him up to me. Cousins can be heroes too!
On my Mother's side of the family there were three sisters; Margie La Juana who was mother to cousins Mickey, Debra and David; Della Lous who was mother to cousins Linda Gayle, Kent and Mark; and Mom, Nelda Berylene who was mother to me, Danny, Chris, Pat and Steve. La Juana, her husband Tate and my cousins lived in Kingsville, Texas near the King Ranch and the gulf coast. Della and her husband Don and the cousins lived in the country, farming and ranching near Goldthwaite, Texas. Mom, Dad, me and my four brothers lived in the smallish big city of Brownwood, Texas. You can see the potential for excitement, learning experiences and good times for my brothers and I (the city boys) when we would visit the cousins.

We didn't spend as much time in Kingsville as we did in Goldthwaite due to the 360 plus mile trip compare to thirty two mile to Goldthwaite but the times we had there in our youth are unforgettable. We would travel to Kingsville for vacations with the entire family and there were times my younger brother Danny and I would get to stay with them for a week or two. Cousin Mickey was one year older than me, so we spent most of our time together and like his dad, Mickey was a student of nature, as was David, his brother. Their knowledge and skills in hunting and fishing were second to none and their respect for nature and the things she stood for and provided was paramount in everything they did.

Going to Kingsville was always a dream come true. We would spend hours with Mickey, Debby and David running along the beaches, fishing off the piers, going out in the bay or Gulf in their boat and hunting and traveling for miles up and down the inter coastal canals of the Gulf Coast. There are so many memories of Mickey, Debby and David and so many lessons learned. They taught us the forgotten arts of surviving with nature and how to let nature be a part of your life. I remember Debby, a beautiful girl, trying to teach me to dance and the kidding from Mickey and David when they saw us dancing. I also remember going to the funeral, one of my first, of their friends killed in a tragic car accident and seeing and feeling their sadness and respect for their lost friends.
Then there was the "normal" stuff like going to the movies and sitting through two or more movies at a time, playing games or simply sitting and watching the sun set. It seems like my first sip of hard liquor may have taken place during one of these visits, it was only a taste, it tasted like cough syrup and I hated cough syrup.

This old city boy did a lot of growing up on these trips. Looking back, I realize how patient Mickey and his family were with me. They shared their fishing and hunting knowledge and, even though they did these things on a regular basis, showed the same excitement and patients every trip. I was exposed to another side of life that made a difference in my respect for nature and gave me insight into the things that can lead to happiness and a fulfilled life. It was always tuff saying goodbye.

A little closer to home, cousins Linda Gayle, Kent and Mark lived in a dream world as far as I was concerned, much the same way as I felt about Mickey, Debby and David. Although I know better now, I felt like my cousins had all the really neat and fun things you needed in life that my brothers and I didn't have. They lived in the country, they had horses, they could hunt and fish anytime they wanted, they had a place on a small lake and they could practice driving long before they received their drivers license.

One of the first things I remember learning as a young child visiting the cousins in Goldthwaite was that I was scared to death of turkeys. Della and Don started out in the early years in the turkey business and I mean they had thousands of them. I can remember walking through a gate into an area filled with turkeys and it seemed they all looked my way at once and immediately mounted an all out charge toward me. I may have screamed, but one thing for sure, I evacuated the area quickly. Everyone but me thought it was funny, how was I supposed to know the turkeys thought I was there to feed them.

The charge of the turkey brigade was only a temporary setback. I quickly learned not to fear the feathered creatures, at least I learned how to mask my fear. As time went on, they fazed out of the turkey business and moved into sheep, goats and finally cattle. I was not nearly as paranoid about the livestock as I had been about the terrible turkeys.

Kent and Mark were raised around horses and rodeos and had the trophies, belt buckles and ribbons to prove it and just because Linda Gayle was a beautiful gal, she knew her way around a horse and had her fair share of trophies. You certainly wouldn't want to challenge her to a barrel race! Naturally, when we came to visit the first thing we would ask was if we could ride horses and even though that may have been an everyday occurrence for the cousins, they were always happy to oblige. So, we (they) would saddle up the horses and ride horses for the rest of the day. It was never a leisurely ride, we would play follow the leader climbing hills (falling off horse), jumping logs (falling off horse), chasing snakes down the creek bed (too afraid to fall off horse) and running full blast. There were times we wouldn't use saddles and ride bareback (talk about falling off a horse). On those days, usually in warmer weather, we would ride the horses into a stock tank and jump from the horses backs and do a little swimming.

Although us city boys (me and my younger brother) eventually caught on to the riding horses and the ranch/farm life, Linda Gayle, Kent and Mark were always patient in their teachings and instruction and gave us fun times that we would never forget.

Probably the best of all the good times with the cousins was when Mickey, Debby, David, Linda Gayle, Kent, Mark and us Beck boys were all together. Several times a year, on vacations and holidays, we would all get together, usually either in Blanket, Texas at Mama Mae Delle and Papa Dan's (our grandparents house), or in Goldthwaite, Texas. We always had something going on and always did it together. When in Blanket Papa Dan would gather up his fox hounds or his coon dogs and we would walk for miles listening to the dogs and Papa Dan's yodeling response. We would walk to the High School and play football on the football field and we didn't know what touch football was. In the evenings we would walk to the cemetery or downtown Blanket and sit in front of the old abandoned buildings and tell scary stories. Everybody in town knew Mae Delle and Dan's grandkids.

If not in Blanket, we would all get together near Goldthwaite or Lake Merritt. Of course there would be horse riding, hunting, football games and a lot of good food. When we were at Lake Merritt, a small private lake built back in 1915 by the Santa Fe Railroad to supply water for steam engines, we would be in or around the water all day long. There would be boat riding, skiing, fishing and swimming. I recall one night when Mickey, Kent and I went out in a small boat catching bullfrogs. Not gigging and killing them but catching them with our hands and keeping them alive in a tow sack. You see, for some reason there were no bull frogs down around Kingsville and Mickey was taking these specimens back to try and stock the ponds in that area.

Yes, I can still hear the laughter of those days. The constant joking, the romping and stomping and the sharing of good times was a constant. The cousins may have been doing what they did every day, but for me it was always like living a fantasy. We were not always angels and there were times of embarrassment and disappointment, but we were cousins, we had trust in each other and we had love of family.

Our grandparents are gone now, we have said goodbye to too many aunts, uncles and parents and we don't see each other as much as we should, but we are still family held together by our love for each other and the bond set forth by our parents and our parents' parents. Yes we are cousins, and even though years have passed and times have changed, if needed, I know they will be there.