That would be great, Rap:

Last week, a cousin of mine who lives in Monterray (sp?) Came to visit us. I'd only seen him once (very briefly) since I was a teenager. And that was probably twenty years ago. When I saw him. Not when I was a teenager. His Partner (Do they call the Podnuh's) out your way, Rap?) has a daughter who lives a half an hour away from here, and they come out to visit her and their grandchildren a couple of times a tear, so it looks like we'll get to know them after all these years.

Talked to my sisters today and asked them about their remebrances of Christmas. I've been writing about mine... will excerpt some of them in here when I clean them up a little. Grammar, that is. My sister who is 4 years older than me pretty much remembers things the way that I do, but sister who is 5 years older has no remembraances of Christmas as a kid. That astonished me. How could you NOT remember what Christmas was like when you were a lid? She doesn't remember her childhood at all until High School. So, I'm telling her about her childhood.

Odd.

Tonight, I had practice with the Messengers and we dusted off No Room At The Inn: an old Mahalia Jackson song that I lead as if I was channeling Gene Vincent. We'll do it this weekend at NOMAD and as many times as we sing during the Christmas season. It's a great song. The last verse is:

   "The bellboy and the porter, the waitress and the cook
    Will be witnesses up in Heaven to all the things it took
    When she was turned away, and had no place to stay
    For there was no room, no room at the inn"

I think that it's great how a black gospel song can place an old story in contemporary surroundings, as if Joseph and Mary were trying to check in at a seedy hotel in Baltimore. Maybe driving an old Ford Pinto.

Jerry