All in the Family

I have the weirdest family on earth.

I just came from a family reunion, the first one we've attended in seven years. I got to meet many interesting people, and even some faces that I've never seen before. Also, several of my cousins who have migrated to other countries in the past came home, making it an even more festive occasion. There was Manual, who used to bully us before-- now a full-fledged queen. There was also Robert, formally the biggest goody two shoes on the planet, who apparently became an anarchist-activist in his eight years in California.

I also learned some things about some family members, some of whom I never even knew I had. I'll list some of these points one by one.

- My father's great, great grandfather was a Spanish friar by the name of Don Severino. Since almost everyone referred to him as 'padre', his last name seemed to have been lost to the ages. Don Severino sired a set of twins, one boy and one girl, who would start our family.

- The boy twin became moderately successful, making a modest fortune in sugar. He would probably be upper middle class by today's standards. Lolo Paco, as everone called him, eventually had ten children, five boys and five girls. Three of the boys would become priests, honoring their grandfather: one became increasingly nationalistic, another went to Rome, the other was supposed to have been a mystic.

- The two other boys went on to become professionals: one, Pico, became a lawyer, but apparently became bankrupt. The other fellow is more interesting: Javier would go on to have ten children of his own, but not before undergoing several 'vocations'.

- Javier tried to enter the seminary, but was too wrapped up in worldly affairs that he soon left. Then, he became a Freemason; he married a local beauty whom he forbade to go to Mass on Sundays. She disobeyed him, however, and would sneak off at the crack of dawn on Sundays with a cut of fishing net for a veil, since her husband was a very sound sleeper.

- Over time, Javier left the Freemasons and became a very devout Catholic. From his eighteen children would arise my grandfather, who shared his father's early liberalisitic ideals. In fact, he himself admitted to an aversion to almost all things Catholic early in life. Then, he met my grandmother. Even up to her death in 2004, she always had a rosary at hand and read fifteen to thirty minutes of Scripture at a time; she was the one who taught my grandfather to pray, and brought him back to the Faith.

I'll post more on this subject soon. Right now though I have to finish an essay for one of my classes, an evil, diabolical, fifty page tome on the virtues of democracy. As you can see, I'm going to need all the prayers I can get for this one, LOL.