2-Wheel Hit-Gang

A neighbor was telling us about his volatile, alcoholic family.
One time an uncle threatened driver-father thru windshield with pipewrench—
with 3 children watching in backseat.

A relative moved down near Colorado Springs, got entangled in a motorcycleHit-gang
(cheap to scratch victim’s face, breaking leg costs more, and so on.)

This relative died young, had big biker funeral.
After the hearse came an ordinary truck on huge wheels, with his beloved bike mounted high in the back. Then came all the bikers; family last.

At last moment, wife threw expensive handguns into the grave with the corpse.

QUARANTINE: One kid got scarlet fever; they put ‘family’ into quarantine.
(In practice, the ones working for salary got exempted, could go live with relatives.
Unluckily, I was college freshman, got stuck. They found out later that ‘scarlet-fever quarantines’ were irrational, because one could catch scarlet fever from anyone with a strep throat.)

That left 5 youngest boys, including the patient, and wretched mother stuck in home FOR A MONTH! You want hatred? This was it.

One day it was Leonard & George’s turn to do the dishes. Quickly they started quarrelling and soon were struggling on the floor.
Suddenly Mother appeared in robe, looking like Lady Macbeth on a bad-hair day. Without a word she took the pan full of dishwater,
poured half of it on the miscreants (gaping at her, still on the floor).
Then she poured the other half on the clean dishes in the cupboard.
‘Wash them all!” she said and left.

And they did.

GOD'S MYSTERIOUS WAYS

GOD’S MYSTERIOUS WAYS:
A 6-yr-old relative just won $1250 in a lottery !
Gloomy Dan worries that the shock and the notoriety will temporarily unhinge her.
She announced that she’d give most to the Church,
because God obviously wanted her to win.

A clash between seeming Mere Meaningless Chance and
the Catholic belief in Particular Providence
(the belief that God controls every detail of your life).

I was reminded of 2 family incidents back in the Great Depression.
1) A beautiful 2-foot Shirley-Temple doll was raffled off. My one sister and her girl-friend got on their knees and prayed and prayed that one of them would win it.
The other sister didn’t pray at all—SHE WON IT !

2) A man called my mother, saying, “Your son Bob just won $200 at the theatre
at Bank Nite !”.[$200 then was more than $1250 now.]
/She wailed, “Oh,my—I forbade him to go to that movie !”
The guy said, “Maybe so, but he was in the front row!”

God is mysterious in His choices.