first in family to.........

ok, so in searching u of k's web site to discern whether my eldest, in fact, made the dean's list......i saw more interesting fodder...such as the story of a fellow who is his family's first ever to graduate from college.........and i got to thinking about my own story....because it is all about me, isn't it?........and i have few distinctions, that...if earned....could classify me as first........not first bachelor's, master's.......nope.....and if i were to get a phd i wouldn't be the first.....and if i were to get a divorce i wouldn't be first.....and i wouldn't be first at consecutive days alive.......not number of invasive surgeries....nor number of countries visited/parachuted into........nor the highest ever income reported for......nor the most children.....nor the most adopted children........i may have an edge in that i appear to the first of my cousins to refuse to dye my hair to cover grey....but that is hardly a distinction...the hyphenated name.....while i feel that this steadfast devotion to egalitarianism is significant.....there are those in my family who still send mail to mrs e weber......after 24 years of hyphenated bliss.......like the hyphenated thing was a passing fancy?.........and i am not the first nor the last to vote democrat......nor the first to be a southern baptist........nor the first to name one's children after a truck....well....i didn;'t actually do that....my cousin tim c named his eldest boy to have the initials gmc.........after the truck..........ouch.........what could i do to top that?........on the other hand.....i heard a first-time story today......about my dad's only sister....who went to college nights to get a teaching degree in home economics.......when her oldest daughter was 13 and responsible enough to take care of the younger 2.........and this was big news.....to know that a blood relative of mine had the gumption to scratch her way outside of the box and do what the heck she pleased......with or without her parents help....so sad that she was the eldest and had no push from her parents to do anything but find a husband...the infamous m.r.s. degree............ah well, but back to me.........i suppose i am the first in my family to sustain a blog for what........2600 posts......not that i have advertised this to the rest of them.......and not that any of them would care to read any of random bits of brilliance.................heck......today my mother read aloud every sign she saw....as if i hadn't the wherewithall to read them on my own.........maybe she doesn't think i CAN read.......maybe i am the first master's prepared illiterate..........now...that is so mean for me to say......but then....this blog comes totally aboveboard as to the meanness herein................