01/31/01

Poor Maddy--- 6 feet tall, 250lbs of solid muscle---couldn’t find a boy in high school with the bravery to date her, decided to go to college at Oklahoma State on a shot put scholarship to “find a real cowboy”.

Maddy used to use her shot put prowess in high school to put any boy who might cause her trouble in his place: You think I can throw these heavy balls far, she’d say, wait until I get a hold of your little scrawny ones.

She also used to joke at the time, since she was so determined to travel at a distance to find a man, that maybe she would be the first person in the family in 100 years to marry a non-relative. Who does she meet at school, fall in love with and marry but a 6th cousin, Cornelius Kuykendall, Texas cowboy, and, according to Percy‘s research, descendant of Jacob Luursen (1616-1655) immigrant to New Amsterdam same as we are.

I guess Cornelius’ parents had him when they were teenagers. He was named for Cornelius on the Planet of the Apes. He was raised by his grandmother in some trailer in the Hill Country of Texas until it was tossed during a tornado. I wonder if the head injury he got then has had anything to do with his wanting to turn into a woman. Sure makes you wonder though how that happens, especially to a hulking Texan with the testosterone level of a rodeo bull.

If you think of yourself as a woman, Maddy made the mistake of asking him, what are you thinking I am? A man?

Phebe and I let Cornelius stay on the place and farm long after Maddy moved off. Swami Hard Salami didn’t think this was good at all, and thought Cornelius needed to make a break from us and give his final answer, as Regis Philbin would say, to the surgeon before he permanently ditched his male genitalia. He was such a damn good farmer though, and Phebe liked all the handiwork he did on the house. I guess we kept him on too long. He took his truck down to the green market to sell his organic produce and hand-crafted cheese and got wasted at some gender bender bar, crashed the box truck on the GWB trying to make his way home. After that Swami lures Cornelius off to do building maintenance on all Swami’s apartment buildings in Newburgh. Said Cornelius needed to live around people as a woman, see if that’s what he really wanted before he passed the point of no return. So Cornelius is living as a woman now---Cornelia---but still is every bit still intact for now. Roll down Montgomery Street, or Grand Street, or BayView Terrace and see him up there on the ladder cleaning the gutters wearing a blonde wig. And God forbid you fail to pay your rent, Swami Hard Salami---psychiatrist slumlord---will have Hill Country Cornelia come after you and kick your ass till you pay up.

Well, it‘s not exactly like that, but still.

Did I tell you it’s the middle of Winter and I live in desolation in a trailer?

Maybe I ought to find a wig and move on out there to Newburgh too. . .

Maddy was always the better farmer of my two children. You’d never know it now but Rocky was a fragile child, born almost 6 weeks prematurely. From almost the first day he came into this world he’s been wheezing and coughing, having allergy attacks of one kind or another. Hell, he was lactose intolerant as a baby. . .to fucking breast milk! Now that’s an auspicious start for a dairy farmer! When it came to being around hay, or animal dander, or poison ivy, or bees---forget about it. He’d either be swollen up like a balloon, struggling to breathe, or oozing some kind of fluid out of one body part or another. Yeah, like he was any better suited to work drywall than farm. All that dust from sanded spackle should have killed him. I should have known it was all a crock. He got in with one of the Umbria’s crew. The drywall shit was all window dressing I think now.

My father’s family got sucked in with Dutch Schultz during prohibition, my son, with the Umbrias. I’m the fucking boy scout of the lineage, I guess. Then again I’m a convicted felon, aren’t I? Well, scratch that then. Well, of course, Maddy made it into the State Police academy. I guess she’s the boy scout of the family. They were going to throw her out when they learned her father had become a felon too in addition to her brother, but she vowed she was permanently estranged from us, and they let her stay on only because of that claim. I sure do miss seeing her.