Omaha Sept 09

feeling really good about my trip here. I forget how nice it is to be a part of a larger family and my family is so uniformly nice it's a pleasure. Joel (my cousin) called to chat with his Mom and asked didn't I feel out of place tagging along on the geriatric reunion tour :-) But actually I feel really comfortable with the generation above me. They know so much and are full of funny stories about everyone! they know where my mom grew up, who was friends with who in high school (Mom went to Central High, my dad to North Omaha, but my Mom's best friend in college knew my uncle....etc stuff like that). Was reminded that my Dad was a really fun guy: President of the student council (in a high school of 2000) good in academics, a bit of a ham, and tried all the sports despite being skinny and short. Apparently was a decent basketball player (???). Lots of stories as Uncle Bill's best college friend Joe Vculek ( VuhCHOOlek) visited. He is a photographer and promised nice pro photos of Darragh and I in the morning. Darragh is the 2nd wife of my uncle Bill and she and I are really getting along. She's pure Boston: an irish catholic who pahks her cah and whose siblings include priests and nuns and an illegitimate oldest sister (parents had to put it up for adoption as they weren't married) that was discovered still in the neighborhood a couple years ago. She and I are official keepers of Guppy the cat. He went to the vet today: confirmed it was boy, un-neutered (which surprised the hell out of me considering how low key he is) and no chip so appears to belong to no one. Darragh will probably take him back to Boston.

Tonight was dinner at the Bayers. the 11 children of my grandmother's sister. Lasagna, salad and about 10 kinds of dessert including 2 boxes of Kolaches that Aunt Casey bought at the Lithuanian bakery. I ate too much of course.Then two tables of Taroky were set up while the non card players looked at photos in the living room. I got to see Milton and Gayle, Milton being the 3rd oldest of the Bayer kids and for some reason the only one I ever got to know very well. I think because he and Gayle never had kids they were freer to travel to see us in the East. Anyway had some good hands and a good game. Realized that 11 kids makes for quite an age span. The oldest are my parents age; the youngest are my age.

This morning the women (me, Casey, Darragh and Max) let the men go golfing while we went on a Good Will tour -- the Good Wills in Omaha are large and very nice quality. Found a fabulous dress and matching shoes for $5 each! Wore them to the photo shoot that Joe Vculek set up after lunch. He lives on a farm in Wahoo, Nebraska which I am told is David Letterman's home town. The shoot was ok but he does a lot of the cheesy poses you find in yearbooks around the world. Still, it's nice to have a portrait done. He makes his real money from the farmland he inherited, which he hires folks to plant and harvest each year. Has dozens of cats around and Darragh insisted on feeding some veerrry skinny kittens/young cats hanging by the barn/photostudio. Joe told the story of his grandmother drowning a litter of kittens in a bucket in front of him as a kid to teach him a lesson (ie. you can't feed every cat that comes around). That scandalized Darragh. And me too, in a way, though I kept my mouth shut. The message is right, I guess, but the solution is drastic. I'd neuter them. he says it's too expensive to neuter 30 cats but I said it's only expensive after the first one gets pregnant; up to that point you only need to fix the one. Even though they look emaciated, though, they didn't seem distressed or even to rush for the food. They must have plenty to hunt for on a farm and I assume most survive alright. Saw a lot of hawks overhead; maybe skinny kittens are a special treat for them :-p Funny thing driving out to Wahoo: Omaha has a numbered grid street system with Dodge, Pacific, Leavenworth as the main arteries through the city, crossing over the numbered streets. Originally the city limits stopped at 50th street but have spread out to nearly 240th street. Anyway after about 20 minutes driving out of Omaha I realized that we were STILL on Dodge! The street just continues out into the rest of the state, far beyond the city itself, into farm land where the square acres extend to either side. I halfway suspect you could drive Dodge Street all the way to Lincoln. :-)

Anyway I feel part of a larger history here. Everyone is Czech , it feels like. Kinda funny. Tomorrow we head to Red Cloud to Willa Cather country. http://www.redcloudnebraska.com/
I'm hoping to see the Homestead museum if I can convince the others.They've all seen it before so it's not so interesting to them but maybe it's been long enough that they won't care.