Danny Boy

Truth be told, there is not much place in my life for second or third cousin Daniel. He has his place in Pasadena and he does not need anything from me. I fail to understand why I should pretend to be connected to Daniel just because we met once or twice at family funerals. I vaguely remember that at the funeral he talked about seeing his redheaded distant cousins, my sister and I, when we first met as children on some occasion that I do not recall, and it made him feel better about being a redhead because he saw that it was not only him. There were quite a few of us in the family tree, including three Butterfields not to mention other occurrences. It's just one of those things that you never know. It doesn't appear in every generation, only now and then. No one can say whether their children will be redheaded or not. But if you do have them, you should not make them feel like they are from some other planet. I vaguely remember Irene Cool, a co-worker at Lockman's, mentioning that her niece was a redhead and got way too much attention from strangers, and that something needed to be done to put her in her place. That is the usual treatment that redheads get from certain people and it is hard for others to understand what this does to your head but whatever. It's just who you are, it's not like you are trying to dye your hair red. If you are like Daniel, you are just a truck driver who works for a plant nursery or something like that. You could have gone to college and done a lot more but you took it too personal when people put you down and you forgot something and started thinking that making money was more important so now you'll never catch up. But at least it's better than being a blonde like Geraldeane Knox who plays piano well by ear and yet weighs maybe 500 pounds by now and has to wear a tent, I would imagine, because she always did eat voraciously.