If you are reading these posts you will notice that they appear backwards...you can scroll down and begin where it says Nostalgic if you wish.
This entry revolves around my Aunty Lucky. Her real name was June, but, for reasons that escape me now, we called her Lucky. She was my mother's youngest sister. Probably 10 or more years her junior. Aunty Lucky was around pretty frequently when the 7 of us were little. My mother was very young, only 17, when she married my father and thus became somewhat disconnected with her family, with the exception of Aunty Lucky. As the years drew on however, we eventually lost contact with Lucky as well, until years later when a strange twist of fate would once again usher her into our lives.
It was the summer of 1978. We were spending a week at a rented house at Salisbury Beach, before we packed all of our belongings into the back of a U-Haul to make our move to California. The house was just a short walk from the boardwalk where my siblings and I would spend the day eating cotton candy and playing arcade games. One early morning my younger brother and I headed over to the arcade with dimes in our pockets. We were going to play skeeball all day in hopes of finally earning enough tickets to buy one of the prizes on the top shelf.
A young woman in cut-off jeans and sandals came up beside my brother and started playing the game beside him. She commented on how good he was doing and how many tickets he had. She asked me if I was his older sister. I eyed her warily and responded with a yes. She then asked me what my mother's name was. When I didn't respond, she rephrased the question. "Is your mother's name Dolly?" My eyebrows raised and I prepared to grab my brother's arm and bolt. "It's okay" she said, "I am your mother's sister".
I hadn't remembered Lucky, it had probably been 8 years since I had seen her last. "Is your Mom here?" she continued. I nodded and we began walking back toward our vacation house. My parents were sitting out on the sand watching the older kids play in the surf. I remember it took my Mom a few minutes to recognize Lucky. It turns out, Lucky was renting a vacation home just a few over from ours.
Many of my mom's siblings had at one point in time or another been involved with the caring of horses, particularly race horses. True to most 12 year old girls I was a fanatic horse fan and would sit, mouth agape as Lucky would talk of her horses.
She asked my mother's permission to take me riding before we departed for California. We visited a local stable where Lucky was well known. She picked out a gentle brown mare for me and a beautiful black gelding for herself. She rode bareback. We rode through the trails behind the stables with her tenderly giving me instructions. I was in Heaven. We returned home that evening to Aunty Lucky's beach house where we dined on lobster. We slept on the floor and giggled and laughed until we fell asleep.
Growing up in a home with 6 siblings experiencing one on one time with anyone was minimal at best. Aunty Lucky had a way of making me feel important. By the time our week at the beach had reached it's end, she and I had become the best of friends. I hugged her tightly and we promised to write. Then we drove off in our family station wagon, my brother and I in the back seat waving out the window.
We had been in California for only a week when I received my first letter from my Aunt. She was back home in Kentucky living on a ranch and continuing to be courted by a man named Gary. She sent me a book of how to draw horses. I wrote her poems and stories and sent them to her often.
Photos began accompanying Lucky's letter's. Photos of the horses on the ranch and the polo ponies that she trained and the new foals of the season. Then the announcement of her and Gary's marriage. A simple ceremony by the justice of the peace.
I was so happy for her. Her letters soon contained plans to have me visit for the summer. Details of which horses I would ride. My anticipation mounted as my parent's agreed that I could go.
One day a letter arrived, thicker than the others I thought as I pulled it from it's envelope. It began with the usual salutations and questions of my schooling. Then the tone of the letter changed as my Aunt began to tell me of someone new who had entered her life. Someone named Jesus. Of course I was from a Catholic background and I knew who Jesus was, but not this Jesus that she described. She talked of making Him her Saviour. Of the inexplicable joy that she and Gary were experiencing since inviting Jesus into their hearts. How she prayed for me everyday and that she knew God had brought her to the beach that day so that she may one day pass on this wonderful news to me. She talked of their growing excitement to see me in the summer and how they would share all of this with me. I read and reread the letter. Often times confused. Some began to call my Aunt a Jesus Freak. I wish I had understood more.
Three days later a phone call in the very early hours of the morning woke us all from our slumber. I heard my father answer and then his words, "Oh God..." There began a flurry of activity. My mom began packing a suitcase. Dad was on the phone again, calling airlines. From my bed, I heard him tell my older brother, "Aunty Lucky was in an accident, she's dead". My brother responded, "Deanna's Aunty Lucky?" The words repeated over and over in my mind. She's dead. My mother came in my room and sat on my bed. Through tears she explained that it had been Gary on the phone. He explained to my mom that Aunty Lucky had been outside working in a ponding basin on the ranch. There was some type of malfunction on a pump, and my Aunt was electrocuted. My Aunt was just 26 years old and they had just learned that she was pregnant.
My mom flew back for the funeral. She met Gary for the first time. When she returned home she unwrapped some trinkets that Gary had sent along for me. Small horse trinkets that had belonged to my Aunt. I sat with them in my lap as I fingered the last letter my aunt would ever send me. The one where she talked of her new life with Jesus. I was angry and confused and grieving. What good had this Saviour been for her? But God, I love those words... But God. But God had plans for this wounded child. Plans that would not yet be revealed but were to come. Plans that began with a letter, a seed of hope, that would one day hold the meaning to total healing and to a renewed life.
Years later, I still have the letter and the trinkets. But more than that, I have her Saviour. I imagine the day I accepted Christ my Aunt rejoiced in Heaven alongside the angels. What a blessing to know that God had called her to Himself, knowing her appointed time and she had accepted His free gift. What a humble notion to think that God would then allow her time to send me one last letter. What an even greater blessing to know that someday we both shall stand together in the presence of our Lord.
