Maybe it was the World War II sergeant stripes that she wore or the fact that none of her
Beneath that gruffness was a woman who liked to talk, and she wanted someone to listen. When I was 12, I got to listen for two weeks—all the way from South Georgia to Vermont and back. She was determined to show me Washington, D.C.; New York; and New England. And she did, from the front seat of her red and black, un-air-conditioned, 1957 Chevy station wagon.
We weren’t 10 miles into South Carolina before she started barking at the predicament we were in—sandwiched in the middle of a too-slow-for-her Army convoy. Hanging her head out the window, she saw a chance to leave the military trucks in her Chesterfield cigarette’s smoke. Swerving left, she gunned the V-6.
Within a half-mile, the big olive-drab trucks rumbled past us. A state trooper was asking, “Ma’am, what’s the hurry?” It’s a wonder the officer didn’t triple the $10 fine when she barked, “And how much of that are you putting in your pocket?”
My dad’s oldest sister was short on diplomacy, and I guess that’s why everyone was happy that she latched onto me. For decades, I was the designated listener to Aunt Lillie’s needs. She was fiercely independent, but she knew how to play me like all 88 keys on a piano. And she wasn’t bashful about asking. In her early 80s, Aunt Lillie called to say that she needed a new car.
“OK,” I said, “let’s lease one.”
“What!” she barked. “You think I’m not going to live long?”
“Well,” I said, “I was just thinking.”
“Well,” she said, “I think I want a Honda Civic.”
I suggested that she take a test drive. Two days later, she called back on my 800-number. (She really liked that.) “I changed my mind on that Honda.”
“Why?”
“Hondas have bucket seats, and my bucket is way too big to fit in theirs. Now, I want a Chevy Malibu.”
