Infotainment for Americans 50+
Plano/Richardson daily on Time Warner Cable Channel A-14 at
Mon, 2:30pm — Tues, 8:00pm — Wed, 6:00pm — Thur, 8:30pm — Fri,
6:30pm
1-800-955-9080
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By Dee Taylor Esther Martina was a simple woman. At eighty-six, she had a stock of yellow-white hair like a shade of a daffodil in early spring. She wore blue rim glasses out of the 1950's, and from laboring in her garden, a ruddy complexion. Her smile made her blue eyes speak aloud. She laughed a lot causing her gold fillings to sparkle and light up her face. She often dressed in neatly ironed pedal pushers, rolled up to the knees. A starched, non-matching plaid blouse completed her ensemble or you might find her in a crisp paisley house dress. Stooped at the shoulders from years of hard work, she walked in short steps because her feet were not in proportion to the upper part of her torso. Her large breasts hung as two sacks of cornmeal to her waistline. Her hands bore the labor of love she had given her family for eighty plus years. She wore little white socks, and slip on loafers. I met "Aunt Estie" when I married her nephew in West Virginia. I learned she was a twin at birth. Only she had survived, and was so fragile she had to be carried on a pillow. Her small stature remained with her all her life. She was the youngest child of Hungarian immigrants. She sat at the feet of her parents and older siblings earnestly listening to how they journeyed to America before she was born. She married young and was barren., so she dedicated her life to caring for her birth family. Her home was an open door, requiring everyone to remove shoes upon entering her immaculate kitchen. Once inside, her home was our home. She became the storyteller of family history. Waiting for her to begin, we would sit at her kitchen table, or on the side porch swing. As the aroma of a pot of cabbage rolls filled the air, we poised ourselves at her knee as she punctuated every tale with the word "onaut," and then she would laugh, setting her clear blue eyes dancing. She held our attention into the hot summer afternoons or wee hours of the night. She had a canny ability to retain facts, and could paint a picture of the event in words as if they had taken place that day. Aunt Estie, was not an adorned woman of fashion, but she had values that we admired. She was a woman with a big heart who served her family and took joy in doing so. From tending to her elderly parents and to sleepovers with the nephews and nieces, she was the favorite aunt of all. Aunt Estie died this summer. We will never forget the devoted family historian, and how she kept us spell-bound as she wove her account from family events, over and over again.
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Last Updated on December 27, 2004
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