OK, you all seemed to enjoy the story of Penny's leg. Here's some more messed-up hillbilly mentality for you.
On my mother's side of the family, there are five of us first cousins. I'm in the middle. The oldest is Brian who is six years older than me. Of course as a pre-teen (Are they called tweens now? Whatever.) I had a huge crush on him. But by high school, he was just my cousin, my big, lovable, funny, cousin, who tortured me on a regular basis - much as an older brother would terrorize a little sister. I looked up to him and he's a funny guy. By the time I started college, Brian was in graduate school and lived with his mom, just a few miles from my house. During the summer, we hung out a lot together. One night, he invited me over for beer, chocolate chip cookies (what a combo) and a horror movie (this ex-Army paratrooper claimed to be scared watching horror movies alone - wuss!). We did our cousin thing, which consisted of hanging out, and crashing on Aunt A's gigantic L-shaped couch. In payback for past torture, I put my feet next to Brian's head. Sweet satisfaction.
Next morning, Saturday, dawns. It's 6 AM and the phone rings. Brian answers and hands the phone to me.
Brian: It's your dad.
Me: Dad? Whaddaya want? (Said in a very slurred, beer/cookie hangover, it's 6-damned-AM-why-the-hell-are-you-calling? voice.)
Dad: Where are you? (Said in the extremely harsh, over-protective-dad-ex-cop voice.)
Me: I'm at Aunt A's house, crashed on the couch with Brian. What do you want?
Dad: You need to get home NOW!
Me: Why?
Dad: You just need to come home!
Me: Is something wrong with you or Mom? Uncle Curtis?
Dad: No.
Me: Then, I'll get home when I've had a shower and breakfast. What's wrong?
Dad: Nothing. You just need to come home as soon as possible.
*Click*
Ooooooookay. I handed the phone back to Brian and we fell back asleep with Brian making some smart-ass remark about my smelly feet. I kicked him. Cousin-love.
So, anyway, we roll out of the house about two hours later and I stumble home. Dad? He doesn't say a word to me about the phone call or my night with Bri. I finally told Mom about the call and asked her opinion. What does she come up with?
Mom: Your Dad must have been worried about some hanky-panky (yep, she said hanky-panky) between you and Brian.
Me: EWWWWWWWWWWW! He's my cousin! That's just.... nasty!
Mom: Well, people around here have married their cousins.
Me: Oh. My. God! Not us! He's.... Brian. That's just wrong.
Brian now lives in the Pacific Northwest with a wife, son, and step-son. We don't talk as much, now that we're busy with our respective families and lives, but we have managed to continually laugh about the morning my dad thought I was screwing my first cousin.
Blech.
Oh, and? As a bit of side info? It's against the law to marry your first cousin in West Virginia, the state where everyone thinks everyone is married to their sibling or cousin. But in Georgia? My adopted state? One can marry their first cousin. Ish. I'm just sayin'.
By the way, make sure you head over to Miss Britt's blog today, where I'm guest posting. Thanks, hon!
Who Am I?
- Coal Miner's Granddaughter
- I am the 40-ish granddaughter of Frank (see header), a fiddle-playing coal miner from West Virginia. I was born and raised in said state and have lived in Georgia since 1994. I have a wonderful husband, three beautiful kids, one cranky cat, and one anxiety-ridden dog.
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Confessions of a Coal Miner's Granddaughter by Coal Miner's Granddaughter is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.
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9 comments:
Oh please. You two totally did it. You have no impulse control.
That's really funny.
I had no idea that there is anyplace left in the US where you can actually marry your first cousin...ick.
Closest my family got, my sister once dated our uncle's nephew. No blood involved...our aunt is my mother's sister.
OH, and one of my sorority sisters dated her step-brother...that was quite a scandal at the time.
All that stuff about cousins confuses me. I think I understand first cousin, second cousin and so on, but I'm not so sure about the once/twice removed crap.
That's funny marriage isn't allowed in the very state people associate it with. Oddly, I think I knew that.
My family tree doesn't fork.
My dad's step-father married my mother's half sister once my blood related grandmother died.
Everyone in the above story was born in Florida.
New meaning to "keeping it in the family."
Ick.
Just a Girl: I can believe it about Florida. We are some wacky people down here.
Okay, firstly I wanted to confess that I have been totally 'lurking' around here, and thought it was high time to tell you how amazing your writing is.
I am an Indian (Indian as in South Asian Indian, and not any other Indian that Americans may associate the term with it).So the concept of dating one's cousing seems quite 'other-wordly' to me.
So I always wondered what goes on in the minds of the people who actually end up marrying their cousins and if it is normal at any level. I find the concept interesting and frankly quite amusing, so thanks for the insight. And of course for the tons of hilarity.
So, yeah I will be lurking around here some more, taking in every word.
Great job at the writing thing.
I had a crush on one of my first cousins for a little while. (Heh, we're from Georgia...) But in my defense, I never met him until we were both grown. I just thought he was hot. Now he's some kind of nudist religious fanatic. I kid you not.
What about all those Tudors and Stuarts and other such royalty marrying their cousins? Of course, they were all sickly, too. Hemophilia runs in my family, as it does in a lot of royal family trees. Just refer to me as the Queen, and no one will get hurt.
Peace - D
My grandma was from Ireland... by way of West Virginia. She and my grandpa (who was fresh off the boat from Ireland) got hitched and moved to WA. My mama always said that everyone in WA was either a Mullins or a McKinney or related to them. So, fearing she would find out she was married to a cousin, she married a Filipino. HEH.
Fab - Naw, we couldn't do it. I was saving myself for you! :-)
MommyCosm - I love it when people fall for step-anythings. It always gets the family riled up!
Donna - If you truly want a cousin explanation, I'll be glad to provide you with one. It can get complicated, but it's good to know so you can figure out which part of your family tree is marriageable! :-)
Just a Girl - Dude. Seriously?
Gypsy - You've got it, exactly.
Narcoleptic - Thanks, hon! What a wonderful complement! I think marriage between family members came from the isolated back countries of the US where there wasn't much of a selection. It was tight-knit family groups and if those were the only people around, then those were the people you married.
Momma - Nudist religious fanatic? You're so lucky... Your Majesty! :-)
Winter - Great story!
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