I would have posted this in my Thanksgiving thread, as this is the story told to the kids about the history of the families, and why, no matter how much animosity there is, the whole family will sit at the table for the big meal.
Early 1900's
My father's family steps off the boat on Ellis Island from Scotland. Not finding much to do, they met up with other members of the clan who founded a couple of counties in a couple of states earlier. However, word spread that Florida was ripe for the making of money. They traveled to what is now Defuniak Springs and settled there.
My mother's side, her father's great uncle immigrated from Crete, Greece, as the five brothers had to escape Turkish justice, as the brothers had brutally murdered the Turkish soldier who raped their only sister. She ended up committing suicide when she found out she was with a roach's child. Her death turned her brothers into monsters, and rightfully so. So after leaving the soldier's body at the front gate of their fort, the five brothers kissed their mother good bye for the last time and scattered to the four winds. One ended up on Ellis Island, and after working his way around, found himself in Defuniak springs, Florida, married to a Seminole Indian woman. Thus is how both sides of my family met.
Wife's sides, her mother's side was from Defuniak, and a very far out relative of my father's side. Her father's side comes from Mobile, Alabama.
Sir, if I have not made it clear is a distant relative of mine, because the family tree turned into a god-damned forest.
Back in those days in Defuniak, everyone was kin some how. But that does not mean everything was Kumbaiyah and cocktails.
See my mother's mother's side came into money. But only because they worked the land on their own, and the shitty part was that my dad's dad's side were sharecroppers for them. That is where the beef started. Just think of the movie and book "Barn Burning" to understand the sentiment and attitude of my dads family.
Skip ahead a decade, and thats when the powder keg exploded.
And it all started with the burning of a tree.
The Greek relatives were dismayed, as most trees from Greece will not grow well here, and the only trees to take were Persimmon trees and Fig trees. As relatives came and went from Greece, once they learned that it was safe to return, they would bring seeds or saplings. Everyone in the family was growing one.
Legend from that side of the family said that it was the Persimmon tree that kept our ancestor family from starving to death, so where ever they put roots down, they pay homage to that tree.
Back to that present.
My dad's side of the family reached a boiling point. They worked their asses off, and yet could not maintain any sort of life. They could only afford the very basic needs, and no matter how good they were at working, the snobs were very tight with the money. Winter came early.
Firewood was scarce. A commodity that needed at least a month to prepare. The land that was not swamp, was occupied, and cutting trees in the water was certain death without tools and transportation.
My dad's family was tired, cold, and hungry. Time was running out. Their supplies would not last to even the middle of winter. However, their anger was what was keeping them warm.
While they were forced to use their resources to protect those god damned fig trees. The trees in question were growing close to the swamp, a little too close.
So once the rich fucks left for warmer visits to relatives in Texas, an insidious plan came to life.
Swamp gas, or now known as methane is flammable.
The fire had spread through the swamp, the figs were burned beyond saving. But the trees were charred enough to fall on land. However...
Setting a fire like that caused damages.
The town arrested those that were witnessed to starting the fire.
Spring.
It seen a gunfight between one side's elder and the other side's elder of the family. Both men were drunk as two skunks and the only thing to die was a poor squirrel and their pride.
The Sheriff swore that he would shoot the two old men in their asses if they started shit again, and he did in fact shoot them in the asses. Not a high point in the family history.
Now after hard feelings and the Matriarchs taking all the men by their balls to settle them down, came an issue.
It was a nearly decade before the Depression. but with boys returned home from ww1 (I am not clear on this, as the story gets muddy here, because no one on any side of the family can pin down the men who went to WW1. Some claim that most of the boys went, others claim only a couple, records are really hard to trace back. But the year was 1918, and some never returned.) But down there, it was clear things were going to shit.)
The Great Depression.
A lot of family spread to parts unknown, settling in Texas, Colorado and Alabama. But they never once forgot where and who they come from. They would all travel back home, now hosted in Pensacola, because the reigning and surviving Matriarch lives there, though it is required to visit the family graveyard to pay respects to those who struggled tooth and nail to survive and keep the family alive.
It is tradition, that even if you have no money to do, someone will pay for you to return to your blood home.
Everyone suffered. Old beef and vitriol was buried in the name of survival. So a small band of the formerly rich family managed to open a bakery in Mobile. There my maternal grandmother would meet the love of her life. Now by now Defuniak was less a powder keg and just a little party popper. There was problems here and there, but from it all a rule was born. When family gather, all bullshit stops.
And then from that point on no matter how pissed we are at who, when the Matriarch calls you for dinner, you better sit and make nice at her table.
And I would not change a damned thing.