Val And Woobie

Uncle Val was an Aussie with a slight speech impediment, which made him a bit hard to understand. He called my aunt Ruby “Woobie,” and he’d shout it from the kitchen whenever he needed some help.. “WOOBIE! HEP ME GIT DA PAN OUT!” She’d excuse herself from visiting and shuffle in there, leaving mom and dad to help us kids watch “Let’s make a deal!” with Monty Hall, which seemed to always be on for some reason.

This was Thanksgiving with Val and Ruby, who’s last name I never knew. Ruby was my mom’s aunt and I guess she’d be about a hundred by now, or more.. Val would certainly be a hundred and twenty. They were old when I was a kid, and although everyone seems old to a ten-year-old, Val and Ruby were ancient.. he was slightly stooped over and never left the house without his cane in one hand and pipe in the other. He always had that aromatic wisp of tobacco hanging around him that so many uncles and granddads used to have, back in the day.

Ruby was plumpish, but not a lot, and she was the sweetest woman in the world. I now know where my mom got it from, since she was second sweetest and inherited the main title after Ruby passed away sometime in the late seventies.

I always thought Val was the greatest cook who’d ever lived. He lived in the kitchen on these Thanksgiving reunions and the spread he’d lay out come late afternoon was fit for a king’s buffet. I knew he worked as a chef in a fancy restaurant, so it was never a surprise that we all got the royal treatment once a year. About a decade after our last time with them, mom told me that he’d never been a “chef,” but rather a cook at a greasy-spoon in downtown San Francisco.

Another childhood illusion shot to hell.

Coffeesister and I found the old house during a visit to San Francisco a few years back. It’s on Van Ness not far from downtown, and as we sat in the car and looked over its traditional San Francisco style facade, I grew more than a little wistful and melancholy recalling those (at least) ten annual Thanksgiving day visits we enjoyed. I didn’t recall the earliest ones of course, but I knew that mom and dad had been going there since being married in 1957, so I certainly must have gone along every year starting in November of 1959.

I miss them terribly whenever this holiday rolls around, and I miss mom and dad, both of whom are long gone now. Val taught me what a boomerang was, since we all admired the fancy one he had on display in the living room. He never took if off the wall, claiming it was made of the bone of a large whale that had been slain by one of his ancestors. The wink that accompanied that story might have discredited it, but great-uncles with bushy white mustaches and funny accents always told the truth, didn’t they?

Ruby sewed things, and even though mom sewed things too, she’d take the specialty jobs to Ruby because Ruby was the sewing queen of the universe. When mom passed away I found aunt Ruby’s sewing basket tucked into a special corner of her cedar chest reserved for treasures of the past.

We’re on our way to San Francisco, that coffeesister and I, and we hope to live out the rest of our days there. I feel as though I’m finally going home, but on this Thanksgiving holiday we find ourselves with family in a small town in central California. I’m once again wistful and melancholy as I recall those early days, but at the same time determined to make a fond memory for the kids in attendance in this household, despite not having a boomerang. I may step outside and smoke a cigar though, so I’ll smell like a great-uncle, and I could tell a few tall tales later on this evening.

I’m pretty good at that, and at adding a wink when needed.

God rest you, Val and Woobie, I wish you were here.

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Tagged as: family, San Francisco, Thanksgiving