Meeting the relatives – Cousin Gail and Michael

Anticipating a meeting and lunch with my American cousin, I wondered what we might have in common and if we would ‘click’. Gail is my mother’s cousin, my second cousin.

Gail and her husband, Michal, offered to come into San Leandro from San Jose and meet us Aussie relatives.  Gail is my Aunt Mavis’ second daughter.

So they arrived and were quickly in the door and being introduced. Gail took one look at me and said, “We have the same dimples. No-one in my father’s family has them so the dimples must come from my mum’s side of the family.”

I agreed and told her that many of our Australian relatives and my own nieces also have dimples. It pleased her to hear that.

Many other tit-bits of information were shared over an informal Mexican lunch at a local restaurant. Michael and Gail had given it much thought and decided that an introduction to authentic Mexican food would be an experience for us and it was. Tasty, spicy, hot!

Whilst Michael and Johno got to know each other, Gail was much more interested in knowing what I could share from my formative years and my memories of her grandparents (my great-grandmother and great grand-father). Although I was only a child when they passed on, we regularly visited their family home and I could recollect some distant memories.

Other things Gail was keen to know were about family ailments, habits, attitudes, and behavioural traits. She was excited and soaked up whatever we could tell her. I hadn’t realized what a big deal is was for Gail to get some sense of her Australian family until she said,  “You know, I’ve never met my Australian grandparents and don’t know very much about them.” Her words touched my heart as I realized that I took so much of my ancestry and heritage for granted. Memo to self - stay more in touch with extended family in future.

Anyway, our lunchtime chat set the milieu for the next seven days as we saw each other often. We visted Gail and Michael’s home, met their son Jeff and shared a couple more meals. We talked about our mutual faith in God, our jobs, our families, our lives.

Gail is newly retired and fortunately was able to spend lots of time with us as we went out on a mission to buy an RV, not that she knew anything about RV’s. However, she did some research and off we went to Gilroy to find the perfect one. We did, but that’s another story.

Gail became our public relations officer, our driver, our advisor, our advocate and our friend. She went out of her way to help us wherever she could, with Michael’s full support. Her advice, local knowledge, introductions and local contacts were invaluable and cut ‘red tape’ back to a minimum. She was sooooo supportive and so excited for us, and our RV journey across the USA.

We are now close relations and life-long friends. We look forward to hosting Gail and Michael when they come to Australia.