Giving Up Standing By the Water

Post #24 of 40

The Barr family reunions began in 1994 when Rebecca was almost three, and Elizabeth was one. Thomas had not been born, yet.

I hadn’t seen some of Tom’s extended family since our wedding in 1986. Three generations showed up - Tom’s parents, uncles, and aunts, Tom’s siblings and cousins, and all their children. I particularly enjoyed getting to know Sandy during the Friday night of that first reunion. In a Gatlinburg cabin that smelled of past wood fires, she and I sat on the floor working puzzles with our kids. The TV’s sound was off, but we looked up every few minutes to see the slowest chase scene ever televised live — the one involving O.J. Simpson’s white Bronco.

Sandy was joyful, full of laughter, mom of three, and slender. Her shiny strawberry blonde hair laid smoothly against her head and swished gracefully toward her lightly freckled face when she leaned over her kids to give them a smooch.

On Saturday, her husband, Rob, and I laughed about being the Barr spouses, not true Barrs, not “Blood Barrs.” We volunteered for kid duty at the creek before lunch. With flat skipping rocks in his hand, he made jokes about the reunion - about how many gallons of tea would be consumed, which IBM technological gadget Phil would introduce, which child would “fall” in the creek first, and how long it would take for us to get a group picture. His running commentary kept me in stitches. After lunch, the “Blood Barrs” stayed under the pavilion looking at family trees, photographs from the past, and World War I letters from Clarence William Barr, Senior. Rob and I volunteered again for kid duty at the creek. It became our thing.

When the conversations waned, we all gathered at the pool. The kids showed off their neon swimsuits, as any available grownup slathered sunscreen on their pale faces and arms. Then the splashes began. One by one, the children made their way into the water - either the baby pool section or the deeper end, complete with water slide. I kept on my shorts and shirt and watched the kids from the sidelines, ready to jump in the water if anyone needed me. I was self-conscious about my curves after joining a family of many slender women, although I never felt judged by anyone but myself.

Slender Sandy slipped into the water with her sons and daughter, and they laughed, splashed, and went up the ladder and down the water slide dozens of times. They had a grand time. She was living life to the fullest.

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Tom and I savored those yearly reunions with the three generations. In the early years, the numbers increased as the middle generation had more children including Thomas in 1998. Then the numbers began to decrease. When one of Tom’s aunts or uncles showed up without a spouse for the first time, we all felt pits in our stomachs.

The 2006 reunion was the hardest one. Sandy, in her forties, had died in 2005 from cancer - diagnosed and died within months - leaving behind her three kids, husband, sister, and her two parents. She was one of the younger cousins in that middle generation — and the first one to die.

Sandy knew how to live and laugh and enjoy herself. She and I never discussed why I didn’t strip down to my swimsuit to get in the water or why she did. I always assumed she pulled off her cover-up and jumped in the water because she was comfortable with her body, but maybe it was so much more than that.

Maybe she was living life to the fullest and in the most joyful way possible, and it had nothing to do with her body - one way or the other.

I learned a lot from Sandy, but not until she was gone. In 2006, Rob brought their three kids to the reunion, and he and I stood by the creek watching them, not really for their safety since most of them were teens now. It had become our routine over the past twelve years. His jokes, now fewer and tinged with sadness, still made me laugh. Getting all the family together and organized for a group picture, even after twelve years, was still fodder for his humorous commentary. That was the last year we stood by the creek and laughed.

After lunch, we all gathered by the pool; the teens put on their own sunscreen and then helped the younger kids. I pulled off my shorts and shirt, jumped in the water, and splashed with our three kids.