Oh Brother!

Happy Birthday Jimmy!

In the LaFave family order, Garry, Jimmy, LeeAnn, Robert  and Connie,   Jimmy is 3 years older than me and thus the closest in age sibling.  We looked a lot alike when we were younger and occasionally someone would ask if we were twins, which I’m sure he didn’t like.  My mom usually sent me with Jimmy and Garry anywhere they went and so I was the tag a long little sister, always in the way.

They made up for the annoyance by tormenting me with cottonwood beetles…those ugly cream color bugs with black spots on their back. They would put them in my bed, chase me around the yard with me screaming, and throw them at me.    My mom would say “you boys quit picking on your little sister”.. Like that worked!   I got them back by tattling on them on a regular basis.

Particularly Jimmy who seemed to always be in a fight in grade school.  More than once I can remember running home after school as fast as I could to tell my mom that Jimmy was gonna fight someone at the baseball field.  She would load me and the younger kids in the car and drive to the fight site and make Jimmy get in the car.  That probably got him into even more fights come to think of it.  Pretty hard to believe I know because Jimmy is one of the most laid back, non confrontational adults I know.

When they weren’t tormenting me with cottonwood beetles they were throwing chinaberries at my best friend Joni and me.  I was scared of everything when I was a little girl, particularly “ghost stories” and so he and Garry would come into my room at night sometimes and hide in the closet and in a spooky voice say things like “we are here to take you away”  which always made me jump up and run screaming into my mom and dad’s room.   

When we moved to Stillwater, Jimmy was pretty popular with the girls.  Including a lot of my friends. I had a hard time sometimes figuring out if certain girls wanted to hang out with me for me, or to be able to be in the same vicinity as Jimmy.   He hated that my mom made him give me rides to school when he was a Senior and I was a freshman.  It wasn’t cool.  There were many days he would “accidently forget” me and I would have to ride the bus.   Still, when it came down to it, Jimmy looked out for me. Once when a boyfriend refused to return a shirt I had loaned him, Jimmy threatened to beat him up.  I got my shirt back. 

As we got older, and Jimmy moved away, I didn’t see him as much.  Still every family Christmas you could count on him keeping everyone entertained..not with his music but with his funny stories.  He is one of the funniest people I know. 

It’s been great watching his career through the years and I always admired the fact that he never gave up on his dream, even when he had hard times.  And in spite of his success, he is still as humble as he was back when Shakey’s Pizza in Stillwater was his only gig.   And I learned long ago that as a “songwriter” Jimmy thinks I’m pretty lame.  He took what was to be my big debut song “Potholes in the Highway of Life” and turned it into a rap song.  And he’s right of course.  Songwriting is not my forte.

It’s always fun to go to one of his shows and be introduced as his sister.  Suddenly everyone wants to talk to me and find out what Jimmy was like as a kid.  Or what it was like growing up with such a talented brother.  The “celebrity” thing always surprises me because to me he’s just Jimmy.  A few weeks ago I was in Austin and we went to a South by Southwest musicfest performance at a downtown restaurant.  I was in the bathroom in a stall and I heard a lady say “I heard Jimmy’s sister from Oklahoma is here.  I bet she has a lot of stories about Jimmy.”  When I came out of the stall I said “I’m LeeAnn, Jimmy’s sister.”  Suddenly I was bombarded with questions…what was he like as a kid, is he married, has he always been so talented, how does it feel being his sister”.  It was really pretty funny.  I felt pretty special.  I answered their questions, returned to my table and watched him play.  He was good.  Always is.  But to me, he’s Just Jimmy. 

The last few years since our mom died I haven’t seen Jimmy as much. The family still gets together for holidays and birthdays most of the time. But Jimmy is in Austin, pretty far away to be able to come for Sunday lunch in Kingfisher.  A lot of times, he is on the road.  Now that my son and his wife live in Austin I have seen him a lot more than I used to. 

He doesn’t perform that much in Oklahoma anymore…The Woody Guthrie Festival this weekend will be an opportunity for me to see him again.  I love that I can go backstage with the musicians by telling the “gate guard” I’m Jimmy’s sister. 

 He was home a few weeks ago for Fathers Day which was absolutely wonderful because it was the first time since my mom died that all 5 of us had been at the same place.  As we sat and looked through old pictures, many of which I have linked below, it felt good to know that in spite of the different paths all our lives have taken us down, when we get together its like the old days in Mesquite, Texas growing up.  

We share a lot of the same memories. We have a bond that time or distance cannot break. He is my brother and I am proud of him, proud to say I’m his sister.   

And today, on his birthday I wanted to tell him so.  Thanks for all you’ve done for me through the years Jimmy.  I love you!    Leedybohunkus   (where he came up with that to call me as a kid I don’t know but I remember it 50 years later…LOL)

http://s1110.photobucket.com/albums/h448/elan58/Me%20and%20Jimmy/?albumview=slideshow