Hey gang, Liv here.
I thought I should talk about what I did recently, because it is important to my life, and it also took up most of my weekend.
Recently, my honorary grandpa Hugh Strele passed away. He was 89, and this weekend, I went up to Mountain Ranch to say goodbye. I stayed there all day, starting at 4 am, comforting and consoling his wife Esther, and their dog, Tiger. Even though it took up a lot of chill time, there was no place I would rather have been then right there with them, to ease pain, and keep them company. At the end of the day, there was a memorial service. Nearly half the town came to pay their respects. At the end of the service, Grandma Esther was presented with the American flag, to thank Hugh for his service in WWII and in Vietnam. Everyone applauded, and I have never seen my honorary grandmother so happy, so proud, or so sad.
I admit, I probably cried a whole lot. I blubbered like a small child, so sue me. It was beautiful watching the whole town brought together, and I bet you $5 you would have cried too, if you felt like I did. However, my grandpa lived a great life, and we celebrated his life instead of mourning in grief.
One of the upsides of this sad time, mainly the "Cheers" in the title, was that I got to meet a lot of my honorary cousins and uncles and aunts. Oh, I'm sorry. I say honorary, because I'm not really related to them. Even though they have other real parents, Hugh and Esther sort of adopted my Mom and Dad, so they are my honorary relatives. I treat them just like I would my real family.
Anyway, I got to meet all of my honorary family, and after the memorial, we had a blast. I played-with/babysat a whole bunch of cousins for a really long time. I enjoyed it, though it was mostly just running after a lot of 6 year olds on a sugar high. We also found a cave close to my grandma's house! It was soooo cool. Like, cold. No, seriously, it was around 20 degrees down there. But anyway, I had a lot of fun, and the food was great. I was grateful for the company.
So, that was my weekend. It was full of joy and sadness, but everything turned out to be okay. I was glad to be there with my family, honorary or no. I love them all, and I loved Hugh.
Thanks for reading, I'm working on my vlooogs! Be excited, be very excited!
Later,
Liv
