We have my sista and good friend, PK, to thank for this. She sent me this email last Thursday, and I quote:
“Our Family’s X Annual Pie Night” in this year’s case it
would be “Our Family’s 4th Annual Pie Night.”
Why “Our Family” you may ask? Simply because you never put
up airs and pretend that one name means more to you than another and I would
venture to guess that neither do any of the Chenoweths, Wolffs or Langstons
(with the exception of one thing which I will get to in a moment). I would
venture to guess that you all refer to gatherings as Our Family or My family.
From what I can tell everyone who attends pie night would be in one way or
another your extended/adopted family. They may not realize/think they are but
they are, I can tell by the way you respond to each and every person who
attends and you are selective about who attends opening it to those you and
your children are closest to in one way or another. Now back to my second
suggestion which would be my first suggestion but being as green as I am I
don’t want to hurt any feelings but I think I can throw out justification to
make it work. “Our Morrison Family’s Annual Pie Night.” Your mother is so
integral in your love for cooking and baking that it would very fitting to
honor her name in that way and while some could argue that her Family Name is
not Morrison and while I did not know her something tells me she would be ok
with that name.
How cool is that? Morrison was my maiden name. Daddy was an only son, and both of his sons passed away without having any children of their own. So using Morrison in the Pie Night name actually works on a couple of levels. The tribute to my mother level that PK highlights plus a way to keep the name alive in our conversation since otherwise, this particular branch of the Morrisons has ended as it pertains to the family name. And I will have to check with my sister on this one, but I believe our daddy's father was also an only son, so we'd have to go back a few generations before we hit the branch of the tree that would still be carrying on the name in the traditional sense. (Please don't write me about how old-fashioned and archaic I sound or the beauty and wonder of hyphenated names. I get both of those things; it just didn't happen that way in our family, and I don't see anyone adding Morrison to their name in a hyphenated way anytime soon.)
Back to my story. So we have an official name for Pie Night! It will be "Our Morrison Family's Annual Pie Night." This year will be Our Morrison Family's 4th Annual Pie Night - or I suppose it could be Our Morrison Family's 1st Annual Pie Night since it would be the first Pie Night with this name, but that would get too confusing, so we will stick with Our Morrison Family's 4th Annual Pie Night for this year. Thus making next year Our Morrison Family's 5th Annual Pie Night.
Have you picked up on the new name yet? I'm being so clever here and making you have to figure it out with clues and stuff, after all. I am sneaky like that.
So no matter who comes to Pie Night - be they Langstons or Chenoweths or Wolffs or Crows or Wildeys or Slys or Gaisfords or Kunzs or Lollars or Andersons or Kormans or Sinns or Muellers or Maddoxes or Bradleys or Morrisons or Any Other Surname - they will, for one night a year, be part of the Morrison family.
I wish that I had an electronic pic of my mother to include with this post. Whenever I get one, I will edit this post so you can see her. Like mothers everywhere, she truly has influenced how and why I cook and bake. She humbly loved people with her ears as she listened and made people feel heard, with her prayers, with her kind spirit, as well as with her Mexican Salad or her Peanut Brittle or her Burnt Sugar Cake or her Aunt Bill's Candy or her Roast Beef, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans and Fruit Salad for Sunday lunch or her Pecan Pies or her Pumpkin Pies. (She is the only person I ever knew who would run the end of a stick of butter over the top of her pumpkin pies just as they came out of the oven to give them a final gloss and finish of buttery richness and sweetness.) It's also why I felt compelled to take peanut brittle to our family reunion back in late June.
I love you, Mother. I still miss you. You've been gone now for over 10 years. I see your hands in my hands now when I am buttering bread for Hot Cake Toast. I wish I could be half as good a Mimi or Grandma Deb to mine as you were a Grandmommy to my children. I think of you every time I get down on the floor, remembering how you would easily get up and down off of the floor well into your late 70s. I want to be that young at heart my whole life. Thank you for being such a great Mother.
(Deb Disclaimer: The above list of family names is in no particular order so no inference of preference or favor should be interpreted in the listing. They are simply stream of thought and brain rememberance only. You each mean so much to me, and I am so glad you are in my life!)
How cool is that? Morrison was my maiden name. Daddy was an only son, and both of his sons passed away without having any children of their own. So using Morrison in the Pie Night name actually works on a couple of levels. The tribute to my mother level that PK highlights plus a way to keep the name alive in our conversation since otherwise, this particular branch of the Morrisons has ended as it pertains to the family name. And I will have to check with my sister on this one, but I believe our daddy's father was also an only son, so we'd have to go back a few generations before we hit the branch of the tree that would still be carrying on the name in the traditional sense. (Please don't write me about how old-fashioned and archaic I sound or the beauty and wonder of hyphenated names. I get both of those things; it just didn't happen that way in our family, and I don't see anyone adding Morrison to their name in a hyphenated way anytime soon.)
Back to my story. So we have an official name for Pie Night! It will be "Our Morrison Family's Annual Pie Night." This year will be Our Morrison Family's 4th Annual Pie Night - or I suppose it could be Our Morrison Family's 1st Annual Pie Night since it would be the first Pie Night with this name, but that would get too confusing, so we will stick with Our Morrison Family's 4th Annual Pie Night for this year. Thus making next year Our Morrison Family's 5th Annual Pie Night.
Have you picked up on the new name yet? I'm being so clever here and making you have to figure it out with clues and stuff, after all. I am sneaky like that.
So no matter who comes to Pie Night - be they Langstons or Chenoweths or Wolffs or Crows or Wildeys or Slys or Gaisfords or Kunzs or Lollars or Andersons or Kormans or Sinns or Muellers or Maddoxes or Bradleys or Morrisons or Any Other Surname - they will, for one night a year, be part of the Morrison family.
I wish that I had an electronic pic of my mother to include with this post. Whenever I get one, I will edit this post so you can see her. Like mothers everywhere, she truly has influenced how and why I cook and bake. She humbly loved people with her ears as she listened and made people feel heard, with her prayers, with her kind spirit, as well as with her Mexican Salad or her Peanut Brittle or her Burnt Sugar Cake or her Aunt Bill's Candy or her Roast Beef, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans and Fruit Salad for Sunday lunch or her Pecan Pies or her Pumpkin Pies. (She is the only person I ever knew who would run the end of a stick of butter over the top of her pumpkin pies just as they came out of the oven to give them a final gloss and finish of buttery richness and sweetness.) It's also why I felt compelled to take peanut brittle to our family reunion back in late June.
I love you, Mother. I still miss you. You've been gone now for over 10 years. I see your hands in my hands now when I am buttering bread for Hot Cake Toast. I wish I could be half as good a Mimi or Grandma Deb to mine as you were a Grandmommy to my children. I think of you every time I get down on the floor, remembering how you would easily get up and down off of the floor well into your late 70s. I want to be that young at heart my whole life. Thank you for being such a great Mother.
(Deb Disclaimer: The above list of family names is in no particular order so no inference of preference or favor should be interpreted in the listing. They are simply stream of thought and brain rememberance only. You each mean so much to me, and I am so glad you are in my life!)
No comments:
Post a Comment