No one asked what I wanted for Christmas, but I made a list anyway, for my own edification. Let's see: A Pashmina scarf would be nice, or a Swiss Army knife, or Dior "Cherie" perfume, or some wind chimes, or gift certificate for a pedicure etc. Not too extravagant eh? What I wound up getting for myself was new underwear. Wearing drawers where the waistband elastic is stretched out, and bras that are beginning to stretch to two sizes bigger is the pits, so there you are. I'd have to get new ones.

I went to Wallymart for this, of course. I also had brought along precious photos of relatives on my dad's side of the family, to make copies for my daughter's albums. A photo of my granny Lou, one of granny Lou and her husband Wiley, and one of Wiley's parents, Quincy and Nebraska. Quincy had a mischeivious little grin. That couple were my girls great great grandparents. So The attendant did all the button pushing and I ordered four copies of each. Twelve enlargements in all. The machine was glacially slow, as it begrudgingly spit out the copies.

Finally eleven copies descended into the tray. Long wait. Number 12, a copy of grandpa, didn't appear. The clerk opened the machine twice and tweaked buttons. She said she must have punched in the wrong # of copies. There was a line of people waiting to use the machine, so I finally gave up and left, but I knew she had punched in 12 copies, not eleven. Gee I hated to possibly leave grandpa in the machine. It seemed so disrespectful.

I went on and bought my old lady whitie's cotton underwear, but before leaving the store, went past the photocopier kiosk for a look--and there was grandpa, propped up on top of the machine, with that grin like "Ha, that machine tried to eat me but I got loose!" The clerk said he popped out after I left and she couldn't find me, but grandpa and I were happily reunited.

These photos of my relatives show their hard lives. Their clothes were worn and mended, their hands gnarled from toil, their faces wrinkled. They were of obviously European heiritage, and obviously from the poorest ancestors. I cherish them, and feel a tender pride in them. I thought of all they had survived in Europe--wars, plagues, famine, wars, diseases, invasions, wars, wars over the centuries. How tough they must have been to have descendants to come to a New World to wind up settling to a hardscrabble life in the Mississippi boondocks. I'm so glad grandpa wasn't eaten by the machine. Come on you, I said to him. You're going home with me.

susil