One morning last week on my
walk into work, I walked right past my cousin Stephen in front of the Strathmore
shops.
Sorry, wishful thinking! It was actually a teenager I'd never met (as the real Stephen is many thousands of miles away, hopefully minding his mother) but from his hooded sweatshirt, jeans, sneakers, hair color, hair-style and gait to his twinkling blue eyes (which I'm pretty sure he inherited from our grandfather) this lad was the spitting image of my cousin. I couldn't help but grin.
Still smiling to myself several strides later, I nearly bumped into my brother-in-law. Tall, dark and stylishly handsome, dressed in a sharp dark suit with his hair expertly styled, this was Jesse only on his way to work at some corporate job in downtown Wellington.
Quite a coincidence I chuckled to myself, made a mental note to tell Brandie and then didn't think much more about it until that evening, on my drive home from work I nearly ran over my step-brother David as he crossed the street (outside of the crosswalk, I'll have you know Katie) with his takeaway from one of the Strathmore restaurants.
This sort of thing used to happen to me occasionally when I spent two semesters in college studying abroad. Every once in a while I'd glimpse a face in a crowd that strongly reminded me of my dad or my sister, both of whom I missed awfully and would have loved to have visit me in the amazing city I was living in. For a brief moment your heart skips, thinking it's some unbelievable, incredible surprise on the magnitude of ten Christmases and birthdays rolled into one, and then the heartache hits and you have to make the most out of just getting to "see" these people you miss so dearly. Often the rest of the day is spent imagining the places we'd go, things we'd see, restaurants we'd eat at.
So Stephen, Jesse and David: thanks for the visit, and I hope you enjoyed all the fun stuff I imagined we'd do in Wellington - I sure did! And if our extended family does decide to move into the neighborhood after McCain/Palin steal this year's election, well I can't blame you (and we'd love it if you did.)
Sorry, wishful thinking! It was actually a teenager I'd never met (as the real Stephen is many thousands of miles away, hopefully minding his mother) but from his hooded sweatshirt, jeans, sneakers, hair color, hair-style and gait to his twinkling blue eyes (which I'm pretty sure he inherited from our grandfather) this lad was the spitting image of my cousin. I couldn't help but grin.
Still smiling to myself several strides later, I nearly bumped into my brother-in-law. Tall, dark and stylishly handsome, dressed in a sharp dark suit with his hair expertly styled, this was Jesse only on his way to work at some corporate job in downtown Wellington.
Quite a coincidence I chuckled to myself, made a mental note to tell Brandie and then didn't think much more about it until that evening, on my drive home from work I nearly ran over my step-brother David as he crossed the street (outside of the crosswalk, I'll have you know Katie) with his takeaway from one of the Strathmore restaurants.
This sort of thing used to happen to me occasionally when I spent two semesters in college studying abroad. Every once in a while I'd glimpse a face in a crowd that strongly reminded me of my dad or my sister, both of whom I missed awfully and would have loved to have visit me in the amazing city I was living in. For a brief moment your heart skips, thinking it's some unbelievable, incredible surprise on the magnitude of ten Christmases and birthdays rolled into one, and then the heartache hits and you have to make the most out of just getting to "see" these people you miss so dearly. Often the rest of the day is spent imagining the places we'd go, things we'd see, restaurants we'd eat at.
So Stephen, Jesse and David: thanks for the visit, and I hope you enjoyed all the fun stuff I imagined we'd do in Wellington - I sure did! And if our extended family does decide to move into the neighborhood after McCain/Palin steal this year's election, well I can't blame you (and we'd love it if you did.)
jake - they can't win - it would be too awful if they did! maybe you'll see a nz version of mark, julie, emily & liam too!
:)