#uncoffeed...

Family is a funny thing. For me, it's funny like a congealed salad mold, or maybe those tiny canned hot-dogs usually meant for babies. It's a novelty with dubious beginnings and we're not so sure we want to hand down the recipe. AC Ewing was my father's father. I remember meeting him once at his home in Kansas. He had two matching dogs and a dining room that was open at both ends. I remember being asked firmly to Go Sit Down, and stop going in circles like a train (which is what I was doing in my mind.) I remember leaving with the impression that AC and his second wife didn't like kids much. But this story really begins with my father. He took us to Oklahoma every summer to visit his grandparents, but not AC. He took us to Texas with his second wife, but ultimately lost custody. Eventually he severed ties with all of us, but I got his phone number through a genealogy contact. My dad asked me if any of his kids had graduated high school, and he sent me $50 for the ph...