TUPATALK: Reunion

I didn’t make the Labor Day family reunion this year.

Nothing unusual — it’s several decades since I attended the last one.

Not that I wouldn’t want to attended more. But my adult life has been crowded with a church mission to Italy, the demands of college and the workplace, service in the Marine Corps and more than 30 years as a full-time journalist.

I believe the last family gathering I attended — the fall prior to landing my first newspaper job — was a golf outing at a course in the Salt Lake City area. I don’t remember much about it, other than the friendly faces of uncles and great uncles and the few cousins I knew. But, then again, my golfing pursuits seldom have been very memorable.

I once almost ran into an alligator — we were about 15 feet apart — at hole on a military golf course at Parris Island, S.C. Despite playing several rounds back then, I made only one legitimate par. At least I never lost many balls — I didn’t hit them that far. I don't recall how I did at the Labor Day family reunion 'open' that year. I guess it didn't matter.

But, I digress.

As a sports writer/editor, the reunion has fallen as an inconvenient time — the start of high school football season, as well as the demands of other fall sports.

When it comes to the family gathering, I have to content myself of my happy memories of youth spending the holiday weekend along with about 100 relatives at Camp Kiesel up Ogden Canyon in Utah, plus the reports during the years to me on the phone by my sister or extended family about the reunion happenings.

My Aunt Carol gave me an update about this year’s get-together.

Decades ago, the family stopped using Camp Kiesel. They collectively invested in buying a piece of property up another canyon on which to reunionize. I’ve never been there.

Truth is, I would feel out of place now. Of my 12 great-uncle and aunts — I was close to almost all of them — only two are still alive, along with one spouse. Of my six uncles and aunts, just three are still around. I’ve had great contact, for the most part, with them throughout the years, but not much with cousins other than funerals, with the exception of couple.

But, the memories of those family camps of my youth are as golden as the changing leaves on the trees that surrounded Camp Kiesel.

I recall the cement, outdoor volleyball court where many of us played and laughed, and perhaps some took a little too seriously, and whiled away in happiness many of the hours.

Between volleyball games, some of us shot around at the basketball standards off to the side of the pad.

In the evening, we all squeezed into the recreation room for songs and presentations, highlighted always by great-grandpa’s comments to end the gathering.

During Saturday or Sunday night, some would build a huge campfire and we would sit around on the log seats enjoying the warmth of the blaze and family oneness.

One of the favorite places for kids — representing the eternal struggle for parents — was the little creek that rushed and bubbled along at the edge of the camp. Mothers and fathers were always shooing their children away from the creek’s edge, which included in a little cove watermelons bobbing up and down to chill in the water.

At one of the reunions, either when I was very little or not born, a small child did wander into the stream and began to slowly be pulled away downstream. Without any hesitation to stop and take off his shoes, as some of the others had done, my dad stormed into the water to rescue her. The mother of the girl, my great aunt, spoke until her death about her that incident.

I remember my Mom, my aunts and uncles so young and vibrant, their hair dark, their voices strong, their skin unwrinkled, their legs strong and still with most a lifetime to live. I remember my great aunts and uncles, not that much older, with children still living at home and some not even near their prime.

But, time is both merciful and merciless to everyone — it shows no favoritism.

Thank goodness for new generations helping to keep its spirit alive.

I didn’t make the family reunion again this year.

But, my heart remembered.

This article originally appeared on Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise: TupaTalk column