Paul

I don't know how long I had been asleep, I just know I had woken up like that before. I heard my dad frantically say, "Oh No!" and then I knew something was very wrong. I sat up in my bed not knowing what to expect, and my mom, still on the phone says, "Kathy says Paul's dying on her."

Family used to be a big part of my life. We've moved around a lot but we were always close to my Moms family for the first 10 or so years of my life. She had ten brothers and sisters and most remain in Upstate New York even today. Any time we did anything usually one of them and their kids were somehow involved.

This was alright. I've always been really shy so a lot of times I didn't really enjoy a crowd. A person here or there is fine but when it came to huge family ordeals, they just weren't for me. I'd go sure, but I'd usually cling to my Mom or Dad, and just follow them around the entire time. I did have a lot of cousins my age but like I said, it just wasn't for me.

When I found out we were moving to Texas I cried all day. I was only 9 years old and I knew I was going to have to leave the small pocket of friends I had made there. I didn't understand why, but I knew I had to go. Well I know now that it was very much for the best.

When we arrived in Texas I had members of my Dad's family close by for the first time in my life. We used to have reunions where I was guaranteed to see most of them every year. But my Aunt Doris and Her husband Ed both died, and we just sorta drifted away. We now live Just down the road from my Aunt Kathy and my uncle Paul. They are the only family I ever see, and I spent all morning and afternoon with my dad directing ambulances and helping carry him out of their house. He looked bad, he looked really bad.