Sibling Sunday

Hazel Bond Robertson

Sisters, even far apart, can maintain a close connection.  For my mother, she and my Aunt Hazel were very close, born two years apart.  So close that at one time the story is they even traded boyfriends.  I think Aunt Hazel ended up marrying that one, and I don’t know what happened to the other poor fellow. I wish this was in color so you could see her beautiful red hair. What a sweet, lovely woman.

We would make the ten hour trip up to north Texas from the Gulf coast to visit Aunt Hazel and Uncle John.  How my sister and I enjoyed those trips!  Suitcases were put in the floorboards in the back seat and a quilt laid over them to make a nice comfortable area for Sis and I to play or nap.  No seat belts in those days!  Activities were included such as our dolls, new coloring books, and new crayons (my favorite!), and another favorite: paper doll cutout books.  The time seemed to pass quickly.  We made sure to count the number of times we crossed the Brazos River (five), one of the road trip games we played.  I never cross the Brazos without thinking of that.

Aunt Hazel and windbreak trees

When we got up north to our West Texas family we had four cousins to enjoy.  I’m not sure why we always said our "West Texas cousins." They lived near Wichita Falls. Possibly that’s considered to be where North Texas meets West Texas.  We did a lot of playing outside and my memories are of the sand – lots and lots of sand.  My other memory is the windbreaks, a line of trees planted to help protect the fields from erosion caused by the strong winds.  There were lots of good times under those trees. Now I'm not a fan of sand or wind – hence the reason I ended up in the sandy, windy, high desert of Arizona.  A little warning: be careful what you say you are positive you will never do!  I like to think I’ve conquered that habit, but...

Watermelon Fields Sketch

A favorite memory of our summer visits was eating watermelon. Uncle John would gather us up in a truck and take us to the fields to find ripe melons. Once he told us we were going to go “steal” some watermelons from another farmer’s patch. I’m sure I was keeping watch for the farmer to show up and run us out. Might he call the sheriff?  We weren’t caught, and those melons sure tasted sweet.  Later I learned the field belonged to Uncle John’s brother! So much for “stealing.” He must have enjoyed pulling a fast one on the little girls from south Texas who were so afraid (scared to death?) of being caught. I suspect my cousins were in on the joke, but they’ve never said so.   

Aunt Hazel and Mother would have a great visit while we were busy with the cousins. I’m sure the visits were never long enough, because they weren’t that often.  It was a great loss when Aunt Hazel died at only 48 years old.  My mother grieved so much and mentioned often how close they were.  She explained that in big families the siblings often paired off by twos.  It was a close family, as often happens when families make it through hard times together.  Having each other to depend on made life a little easier.  After the funeral, Mother never went back to north Texas.  At that point, her family was down to four siblings from ten, plus they had lost both parents.  We sure missed our cousins, and the trips up north.

My mother had another sister with whom she was very close, my darling Aunt Jackie, who lived only 90 miles away.  And I have such a neat story about her youngest sister, Lena, at least one that I remember quite often.  I’ll write about them on future Sibling Saturdays or Sundays.