Larry's Letter #5: Complex family dynamics

April 12th, 1967

Everybody loved Larry. I think you might, too. Hit Play!

Our family is complicated, to say the least. My late sister Peggy once said, "We don't have a family tree, we have a vine!" Touché! No truer words were ever spoken. So you may be asking yourself, as I did, 'Why is Larry telling his mother things about her mother and acting as a conduit between them'?

Welcome to my confusing world - my family kept secrets locked up tight. The answer is, I'm not sure.

What I do know is that Larry spent a lot of time with other people in the family through the years. First with Aunt Maude, Grandfather Tracy's sister, who had no children of her own. Larry lived with Maude in North Carolina as a young boy before I came along. That's where his early southern accent originated.

I also know that Grandmother, 'Pauline' as our mother called her, came into our lives following an absence of approximately twenty years away from her three children. My mom and her siblings had been abandoned by their mother for reasons I never knew. One night, the rotary phone rang - it was Pauline and she had cold-called our mother to reunite. They started slow but bonded over the years. I also know Larry lived with her many summers down in Atlanta. He met her final husband John, my new Grandfather, before anyone else, sending his approval.

Both Pauline and Maude adored Larry and took him under their wings when things got rocky. My brother, at least in those early days before the war, was easy to love. He may have been a little rebellious, and a little misunderstood. But to me, Maude, and Pauline, back in the day he was nearly perfect. Everybody loved Larry.