It\u2019s strange the things you remember from your childhood growing up with the passage of time. I remember Aunt Bonnie\u2019s. I went there frequently between the ages of 5 and 9 after my older sister Denise got married. Bonnie lived in a fancy cherry log house that sat high on a hill over looking the river and downtown. The Old Grande Dame of Bellbrook. What was impressive though was not on the outside but the people on the inside. Going to Aunt Bonnie\u2019s was sort of like going to Church. There was a certain unspoken code of behavior. You knew you had to be good because you were visiting GOOD people. Her house was like a church too. Grand. Immaculate. Everything in its place. Filled with niceties like beautiful amber stained windows, Victorian sofas, white round marble coffee tables, giant German Steins and Rosenthal dishes. But just like church, she made you feel like it was your place too. So when you got there, you were greeted, and off you went. Running through every room of the house, out front by the creek, in the back inching your way down by the river slowly so you wouldn\u2019t get caught, or just sitting in the breezeway in the big white wicker chairs- rocking back and forth as fast as you could. Asking for a Coke. One of those small cokes in the glass bottles... the ones that taste better.. sweeter.... Bonnie always made sure you got anything you asked for. Sorta like Church, you ask God for a lot too. Scotty and I would play tag, catch lightning bugs, just run up and down the drive way with the bikes or play hide and seek. I would always try to hide in the living room and go through the front door which was invariably locked and then have to run through the breezeway. Inside was what seemed like a soaring two story ceiling with glassware everywhere. I would try to memorize the position, color and type of every piece before Scotty found me. That way I could tell which were her newly boughten pieces on my next visit. I always started the count with the clear olive green Fenton hobnail shoe to the right of the mantle. When I was young I was afraid of staying away from home. I was ok at Aunt Bonnie\u2019s though. I stayed in the upstairs side bedroom. I was scared. I would cry because I was away from Mom. Bonnie would come up and rub my back until I feel asleep. Next morning, a big breakfast would be cooked, made to order of course with scrambled eggs, bacon, toast and jelly. Sitting in ornate rose carved chairs with black needlepoint and red flowers. Eating like a king or future queen...I would get cleaned up and take a shower. I would wonder if anything in the bathroom had ever been used. It looked brand new. No water drop stains, no soap residue. Just like a new home. Even the soap was unused. Yep. Aunt Bonnie was clean. I used to run my hands under the bed rails to check for dust. Never found any. Looking back over all my education, it\u2019s peculiar. You can teach people a lot, probably the hardest is to teach people to be good. But that is what Bonnie did. You knew that she was genuine, no pretense. She had both a fancy red Corvair and a big Cadillac with a license plate labeled UAT. She tried to convince me thats it stood for You Are Tight- a way of teaching me to be more generous. 50 years later, it\u2019s remarkable what impacts you. I got a love for finer things from Aunt Bonnie, certainly a fondness for glassware, hopefully some small part of her comfort, generosity, and hospitality too.As I get older I know things for which I am sure ... I know Bonnie is in Heaven with Mom, and Heaven is definitely cleaner with Aunt Bonnie there ... and I am so very blessed and lucky to born in a family that had them both. I love you Aunt Bonnie.Jeff
