January 28, 2002
DOWN HOME:
That's why he looks like that
___Seven pieces of my family heritage arrived in the mail the other day. They came wrapped in a plastic sandwich bag for safe-keeping, with two notes enclosed.
___Hazel, a longtime family friend, sent the package and wrote the newest note, explaining: "I was cleaning out some of Mother's things at the farm last weekend and ran across these pictures she wanted your family to have."
___Her mother, Lucille, was one of my grandmother Knox's dearest friends. Her note came folded around the photographs--two of Daddy and his twin, Garvin, and their younger twin brothers, Norman and Gorman, one of them also including their cousin Genie; three of Mom and Pop, known to the world as John and Imogene Knox; and two of Mom. "I want the Knox family to have these pictures," Lucille wrote. "We are both doing pretty good now, but one never knows when the Call will come."
___"The Call" came for Lucille before she could mail the pictures, but Hazel fulfilled her mother's wishes and further cemented the bond between two families. I've seen other copies of four of the pictures, but three--two sets of the twins and another of an early-middle-aged and skinny Mom and Pop--will be duplicated and shared with a new generaton of Knoxes, per Lucille's wishes.
MARV KNOX
Editor
___One picture captivates me. Marvin and Garvin look to be 13 or 14, which would make Norman and Gorman 10 or 11, I think. Optimism and joy radiate from those young faces. No trace of the alcoholism that would destroy Gorman. No sign of loss and sadness and hardship their generation would see. Only gladness.
___But resemblence pulls me back to that photo. I see my brother and me--in our uncles.
___Norman is grinning that pursed-lipped, chin-up grin that my wife, Joanna, often points out to me after I teach Sunday School or speak in public. At least now we know where it comes from.
___And the look on Garvin's face is stunning. "That's Martin!" Jo proclaimed the second she picked up the picture. And we always thought my "kid brother" looked like the Moore side of the family.
___The photos arrived the day before our little family--Jo, Lindsay, Molly and I--spruced up and went down to the church house to make a picture for our church directory. I wasn't crazy about putting on a suit and tie at 8 in the evening, but I thought about those old photographs as we got ready that night.
___God blesses us with families--past, present and future. Someday, Lindsay and Molly's children or grandchildren may pick up a picture we made in the winter of '02.
___I hope they see joy, optimism and gladness in our faces. And I pray they see a little bit of themselves when they look at our eyes and our smiles--but not the top of my head.
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