Amidei weekend: exposition

Here's a little background before the narrative: The reason I went to Gainesville, GA was for Jeff Amidei's wedding. Jeff is my second cousin. His maternal grandmother and my maternal grandfather were brother and sister. My grandfather, his great uncle, died about ten days before I was born. My grandmother and her sister-in-law, Jeff's grandmother, were exceptionally close. Aunt Penny, as I knew her, was an absolutely amazing women who was almost a caricature of the perfect loving sweet "little old lady." I have saved every card she sent me—each one chosen with care and underlined and affixed with stickers. She would send cards for every holiday ("Happy Arbor Day!") ans send me a $1 and later a $5 dollar bill on Saint Patrick's Day so I would have some "lucky green." Okay, the Aunt Penny part isn't all that relevant to the story, except that it is through her devotion that our families have remained so close. That, and Penny/Nanna, although she passed away several years ago, is still very much present in the Amideis' lives.

"Amidei" is pronounced 'Ah-MEE-Dee.' Well, recently. It was, I'm told, 'AH-mah-day' once upon a time. Some of this generation has started to take back the old pronunciation, so at the wedding there were Ahmeedee's as well as Ahmahdays. Mike Amidei, a cousin on the other side, married a firecracker named Amy. They go by the new/old pronunciation as she think's Amy Ahmahday sounds better than Amy Ahmeedee. I agree with her and think the former is a bit too close to Idi Amin.

The Amidei's grew up in Memphis and I grew up in Nashville, so we never really saw them. Patsy, Penny's daughter (only child) and Jeff's mother, is my godmother and we keep in touch as best we can—usually through Christmas gifts and cards and such. Patsy and Penny have always been there for the milestones in our lives: graduations, weddings, funerals and such.

There are only two Amidei children my generation: JP (the older) and Jeff (the younger).

I can only remember one trip I took to Memphis to stay with Penny—I must have been around 10 or 12. This was the last time I saw JP—he might have been at Jay or Mac's wedding but I don't recall. I know Jeff was there because, bless his heart, he loved his grandmother so much he would drive her from Memphis to Nashville so she could be here for our family events or visit Honey (my grandmother).

As I said at his rehearsal dinner, THAT is an act of love. If you've even driven the stretch of I-40 between Memphis and Nashville you know what I am talking about. My GOD is it boring. And mind-numbing. And torturous. At one point I swear you'll think you see dead relatives beckoning you towards the light.

So I haven't seen JP (that I recall) since he was 8 to 10, and the last time I saw Jeff was when he came through SF with his college buddies over New Year's '98 into '99 and they joined us for the Black-Eyed Pea Chili Party. But because he made more trips to Nashville, I've gotten to catch up with him a half a dozen times over the years.

Sure, it was a long way away, and if not for James' willingness to take me to the airport it would have been a streetcar to a train to a shuttle to a plane to a taxi to a 90-minute drive to get to his wedding. As it was it was still an all-day ordeal to get there. But Jeff has spent his life demonstrating his devotion and commitment to family and love and there was no way I wasn't going to make the effort to celebrate his wedding.

So that's that.

Carolina, his wife, moved to the states (and I am guessing Atlanta) about seven years ago from Columbia. All of her family and friends that I met were the most lovely people—inside and out. Of course, typical southerners, we've been calling her Carolina, as in North and South states, not Carolina (Carol-EE-na) as in "it's Spanish you redneck." Unfortunately but unsurprising, I did not get to visit much with with Jeff or Carolina as they were the busy center the weekend's activities.

Patsy and Johnny Amidei moved to Gainesville as his business moved to Atlanta years ago and he had been commuting for too long. Once neither of the grandmothers needed them to be in Memphis, Johnny looked for a nice place outside of Atlanta. And found it he did.

I thought they retired to a "little place on the lake." Not with the so much. They have a beautiful, spacious home at the top of the hill overlooking Lake Lanier.



Mom and Dad outside the Amideis'



View from the deck off of the living room and bedroom
I commented that the master bedroom is larger than my apartment.
"Wilson, many things are larger than your apartment."
"Yeah I know. Things like breadboxes."

Enough exposition—on to the super happy fun times.