Saturday, March 21, 2009

Happy Birthday Sioux!

I’m going to get a head start on wishing Susan a HaPpY HaPpy BiRtHdAy on the 27th of this month. Seems like I’m always the one lagging at reading other’s posts and commenting on them. I have been so busy at work and away from work with things that are going on right now that I find it hard just to sit down at the computer (I do it all day) and browse or do emails and posts. Susan has a very special place in my heart. I know I don’t get to be ‘with’ her or ’visit’ with her as much as other‘s do, but I always think about her and our childhood and things we use to do with each other when we were younger. I remember things like when I got to spend the night over at Grandpa’s and Grandma Mary’s . We’d go to the elementary school to climb up the fire escape and play on the playground equipment. She would let me get on the back of her bicycle and she would be the ‘driver’. We would ride around the old neighborhood in Layton and go for walks up to the store to get penny candy. We would go to her friend’s and play with some very special girls that I later got to know real well in school. Several times I got to go with Grandpa, Grandma and Sue up to Morgan or down to a house my Grandma Mary had on Redwood Rd. We would play around the yard while there and just seemed to have so much fun. One time when my family still lived in the little house south on Main Street, Susan and I went for a walk when it was really foggy. We were over in the Experimental Orchard down the road a ways in one of the fields. I can’t remember if we were pretending we were disorientated and lost or if we really were. I DO remember somewhat being scared however. We made our way back to the house though and were safe and sound once again. We would be invited together to go to my aunts or step aunts to help when they had a new baby, or we went to Aunt Dott’s down in SLC together for the weekend. After Grandma Mary moved back to Salt Lake, we would spend weekends with her. We loved to go out on the corner of 7th East and 13th South and watch the guys pass in their cars. Then there were the years that Sue lived with us. She didn’t know it at the time, but I always wanted to be as cute and popular as she was. She had her friends and I had mine through those years, but because she was my age, we seemed to do more with each other than my other sisters did. We would end up together at Lagoon and would always go to the photo booth and take pictures. We walked to the church together and went and dragged main after MIA with the boys in our ward. She had a lot of the guys always calling her and wanting to date her. Sometimes she wasn’t at home when they called so I got to talk to them. One time one of them called and I had to reassure him she really wasn’t there and that most definitely not with another guy. It took a lot of REASSURING in fact! Susan was always more like a friend and sister to me than an aunt. There were several years at different times in our lives when we haven’t lived very close to one another and I didn’t really know what was going on in her life like other friends and family did, which I regret. However, I have gotten to know Sue even more since she started her blog. I’ve realized more and more what a special lady “my” Sue is and all her many talents. She is a beautiful writer and poet. She’s a wonderful mother and grandma. Her family means so much to her. She loves and appreciates her older siblings and she has grown to be the kind of a person that we all love and appreciate also. I’m not good with words Sue,….but know that you are a very special part of my life. So,….after all of this, once again I am wishing you a very Happy Birthday! I Love You Sioux!

3 comments:

  1. Thanks Nettie for the wonderful words, altho sometimes I feel like you are all a bit delusional about the memories! Next time I see ya, you'll get one of them great 'bear hugs'. Love ya, Sue

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  2. The Big 60 for our Sweet Sue!! Hard to believe.

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  3. You know that you must be a pretty good person when your relatives put down, in writing, such wonderful things about you. I loved the photo, too, every one precious. Looks like I missed out on a lot during those growing up years. Happy Birthday Pretty Lady.

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