Crazy Aunt Ruth

There are times in your life when you regret that you didn't know someone better before they passed on.  You find out things after their death that make you see them in a whole different light and make you regret some of the thoughts that you had and actions that you took while you were alive.

A few weeks ago my grandfather's sister passed away.  We all knew her as the crazy eccentric aunt that always wanted to do something to your feet - or make you try a nasty herb if you didn't feel well.  We never knew what she was going to say or do or wear that might embarrass us or make others think the rest of us might possibly be as loopy as she was....here are some examples:

1. My best crazy memory of Aunt Ruth was when we went to the Nashville airport (she lived in Texas at the time) and she disembarked holding a twig with a strange caterpillar on it - I can only imagine what the person who rode next to her was thinking....I can remember walking a few steps behind them hoping that no one thought I was with them (I was a teenager at the time)
2. She was a reflexologist and believed that all nerve ending in your body came down to your foot, so you could rub a certain place on your foot and it would help your back pain (or whatever ailed you).  She also put all of her savings into a machine that pulled all the impurities of your body out through your feet.  She traveled around doing this for people and never charged them for it. 
3. She wore the ugliest shoes and clothes and sometimes forgot to take baths.  I can remember her showing up for family events and someone asking - "What is she wearing?" - like what she had on depended on whether or not we would claim her.
4. Once while in Texas, a thief broke into her house and held her at gun point.  He shot her and it grazed her head.  She began singing.  
5. While living in Georgia, she took a total stranger with a drug addiction in to live with her while he could get on his feet - we all expected that it was a matter of time before he took everything she owned of value and possibly even did bodily harm to her to feed his addiction.
6. She kept asking me for fertilized eggs even after I told her that my rooster had died.  She had a true love of animals and kept goats and drank their milk and made cheese from it.  She even had a deer whose mother had been killed by a car and fed it until it was grown.  It would still come to her and her only.

I hate funerals - I do not do well at them at all - especially ones on this side of the family.  You see, I was extremely close to my grandfather and seeing his brothers that look so much like him just kills me.  However, my cousin Kim talked me in to going after convincing me that no one else was going to be there and every one needs someone at their funeral.  So we went.  Much to our surprise, the place was packed.  There was standing room only in the chapel.  I heard so many people talk about how wonderful she was and all the good she had done.  I never knew these things....are you sure we were at the right place?

So now as Paul Harvey would say - "is the rest of the story":

1. She stepped off that plane to visit my dying grandfather.  The caterpillar was a rare variety and she brought it just for him to see - hoping to cheer him up and take his mind off cancer for just a while. 
2. Reflexology was her mission - it is how she served people and through it brought many to Christ.  She had a soft voice and talked while she massaged your feet and totally relaxed you.  She never charged for this service and was in fact on her way to do this for someone on the day she had her car wreck.  Some spas charge big amounts to "detoxify" you.
3. Aunt Ruth was never worried about what others thought of her - her mind was always on how she could help others and her own needs took a back seat to the needs of others.  She never put herself first.
4. The song she started singing was a hymn.  She also asked for God to forgive the man who shot her.  I suppose this is why he ran away instead of finishing her off.
5. Again - she put the needs of others before herself.  That's why she took the guy in.  He never (that we know of) stole from her or hurt her.  She won an award earlier this year for work that she did with those who had substance addictions.
6. This one I can't explain - maybe she was hard of hearing.....I do think that some of my love of animals came from her.  I wouldn't be able to leave a baby deer alone in the world without it's mama either.  But I am afraid that is the only way I am like Aunt Ruth.

Aunt Ruth had just gotten a brand new Cadillac - friends say that she loved that car.  She had also just gotten a brand new set of teeth.  I am sure she was buried with her new teeth - to bad she couldn't have been buried in the Cadillac.

Don't read the outer signs when people do strange things.  Always look inside.  There are many in this world that aren't like you and me and it's not our place to judge - the greatest commandment is LOVE.