Aunt Mil

AUNT MIL


No one who ever met Mildred Almond Hacela could ever say she wasn’t her own person! Aunt Mil was a woman full of an appreciation of life, with an ability to find humor in the small things that make up our every day lives. To get a letter from Aunt Mil was to know a joke would be included, something to make one laugh and lighten one’s problems. She could get right to the heart of things, no beating around the bush.
Aunt Mil was a generous person, never forgetting a Christmas, surprising one with a ‘little gift’ throughout the year. I recall one time when money was tight and I was struggling to find even grocery money. My son, Taylor Ford, whom Aunt Mil affectionately called “Model T.”, was about ten at that time. One of her letters arrived and inside was a small check and the admonition to buy my boy some ice cream. So I told T., “we’re having ice cream for supper and you can pick out the flavor.” We feasted on Breyers Coffee Ice Cream and felt like royalty! It was in later years that I learned my father, Aunt Mil’s brother, had a favorite ice cream that had been a treat even when the Almond siblings were young back in the Depression days – coffee ice cream! There is something to be said for DNA....
I always appreciated the fact that Aunt Mil and her husband, Paul, came down to my parents’ wedding in the hills of WV. Of course I wasn’t around then, but I have poured over pictures of their time helping my folks pick daisies along the roadsides so there would be flowers in the church. And I always loved the postcards the Hacela family would send from their vacations. It seemed so exotic to go on cruises and other such adventures. When I was still a young child, I went to NJ to spend several days with Cousin Kay, Aunt Mil, and Uncle Paul in their home on Lafayette Street in Newark. It was a different world from my small rural town in WV....I was terribly homesick at first, I recall, but they were all so kind to me and I soon was having fun playing ball in the street, intrigued with the sounds and treats from the Good Humor Man, learning about life in a multi-cultural city neighborhood.
Thank you, Aunt Mil, for being you. For being a free spirit who knew just exactly who you were and how to live life as it came to you – with humor, with acceptance, with respect – and with strength. We will miss you.