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2009/4/11 Happy Easter Is this late for Easter? I can never remember from one year to the next. Better not let myself get too forgetful, or Noel will be threatening me with "Shady Pines." It's a running joke between us; whenever I do something dippy, she's says, "Well, it's off to Shady Pines for you, Mom." I suppose someday it will really be true, and I will have to go. It is my intention to go gracefully, but I really don't see anyone do that when it's time, so I can't predict how I'll be. Does something happen to our brain chemistry that makes us unable to follow through with our own good intentions? That is my current theory on why people fight the inevitable. Oh yes, I understand, intellectually at least, that making that final move has to be incredibly difficult. Next stop the grave and all that. But often staying at home is really not a good option for any of the people involved.
Well, isn't this just a cheerful entry? But then Easter is about death; how can one not think of it right now? I no longer attend church, except sometimes with Noel and her family, but that doesn't mean I am oblivious, or that I no longer have a prayer life. My father told me once on one of our walks in his garden that he said a rosary for each of his children every day. What a powerful way to say, "I love you."
It is sunny today and relatively warm, almost 50!! I fertilized the front lawn yesterday and cut down the remaining ornamental grasses. There are still plants that need to be trimmed down and some raking to do before I mulch. But I'm making progress. I'm longing for a really warm day where I can be out there in shirtsleeves building up my vitamin D reserves while I work. I get such cravings for sunshine. Must be that southern Italian blood coursing through my veins.
2007/12/26 What a great ChristmasOn Christmas Eve, Noel and her family came over for dinner, and of course, to open gifts. The kids really liked theirs, so whew! to that. They are still young enough to like opening gifts. Those gift certificate years are yet to come, and I'm not looking forward to that at all. But Em is only eleven, so teen stuff is in the future by a couple of years. Our neighbors popped in for a drink after dinner, and that was fun, too.
Then on Christmas Day, I baked a ham and took it to Noel's. Another family joined us for a day of eating, drinking, chatting, and for the kids, general racing around. Then we all sat around their enormous tv and played the CD/TV version of "Are you smarter than a 5th grader." What a hoot. (And what a relief that we adults really were smarter than the kids...or at least had more "book learning.") Fun, fun, fun!
2007/12/11 Better each time Our dinner last night was the best one yet. Four couples, each with a two-year-old, joined the four of us for an early dinner. They arrived at five and we sat down at 6:00. Our previous attempt (four nights ago) to have a children's table didn't work out so well; consequently, last night we borrowed a portable table to extend ours, and seated the children next to their parents. This was a much, much better way to handle a family dinner. Not so much hopping up and down by the parents, and not any at all of touching each others' food! LOL Diana had made a special meal for the children: Star of David shaped pasta with cheese; cut-out-star turkey sandwiches, and cookies for them to frost themselves. After dinner, the parents chatted while the children played, and they played wonderfully together. There is no shortage of toys here, plus the children all know each other from various activities, so playing together was old hat. It also helped that there were ten parents and a grandma present. I loved the total immersion in family of our evening together; to me this was the true meaning of Hanukkah. Family and faith, accompanied by good food and wine. Perfect. 2006/7/4 Independence, what a good thingHappy 4th of July! 1776 seems like a very long time ago, but in terms of the history of the world, it's just a blink. How lucky we are to be born free and to have a Constitution designed to keep us that way. Thank you, Founding Fathers!
Lest we live in a bubble and think nothing else happens but what happens here, let's take a peek at what else was important about that time:
Oh no, it was no vacuum, not even close, when we were plotting and scheming and making fervid speeches, trying to win our right to be ourselves, our own country. Those Founding Fathers would have listened to Mozart, learned the Vienese Waltz, read Voltaire, and been excited by the advances in science. We still study Adam Smith and Edward Gibbon, and Cook's voyages led to the discovery of Hawaii, now our most exotic state. And our FFs would have been very aware of the revolts and troubles in the greater world. For these were educated, intelligent men. They didn't just dream up our country out of the mist, but rather, out of their informed intelligence.
So hooray for the Grand Old Flag, and for those brave souls who led us to freedom. What better way to round out these thoughts than with these words from "America, The Beautiful": Oh, beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties above the fruited plain! American! America! God shed His grace on thee And crown thy good with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea.
And a little more of the chorus: (2)America! America! God mend thine every flaw Confirm they soul in self control, thy liberty in law. (3)America! America! May God thy gold refine, 'Til all success be nobleness, and every gain divine.
Well, what can we add to that but AMEN!
2006/5/26 Memorial Day weekendOnce again it's time for us to remember those who have fallen.......fallen for our sakes. Although i have disagreed with the invasion of Iraq since the idea was first spoken, my heart breaks for those people who have lost family there. There have been many from Michigan. I am in awe of those soldiers who go to dangerous spots and risk their lives, sometimes losing them, sometimes being wounded, always being changed by the experience.
I try to imagine what it must be like to live in an occupied country. What if my little village here in Michigan were suddenly filled with foreign soldiers? It's beyond the scope of my imagination to even picture it as a one-time thing, let alone a daily part of life for year after frightening year.
We are lucky to be Americans, to live in one of the safest places on the planet. We're probably just plain too big to be invaded, and there is safety in that size. How I wish we could collectively remember that might doesn't make right.
Still, despite all of our country's faults, I am glad and proud to be an American. As the sign in the Chicago bus stop said: "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness......way to go, Founding Fathers."
2006/5/14 Mother's DayThe first Mother's Day celebraton was held in 1907, when the 2nd Sunday in May was so designated in Philadelphia.
So what other important things, you wonder, were happening in 1907?
So there you have it. Ninety-nine years later, and here we are....still worrying about the economy and immigration, watching countries around the world struggle and fight, rooting for our team in the series, and sending our kids off to scout meetings. We may, personally, live at a faster pace than those Edwardians, but other than that, it seems like the same old world. 2005/12/10 The best Christmas gift everI was just reading BJ's World, a blog by a nurse in Cleveland. She was telling us about her best Xmas gift ever, and that started me thinking about the gifts in my own past.
I think my all time favorite gift dates back to the very early 1950s, back to those days when I wanted so desparately to have a horse, to be just like Dale Evans. Every year, of course, I asked Santa for a horse...and every year, I didn't get one. My mother tells me that one frustrating year I wouldn't even mention to my parents what I had asked for, so my parents were trying every devious means they could think up to get the information out of me ... to no avail. You won't be surprised to learn that I had asked for a horse again!! I was 8, I think, and had thought that if only Santa knew, if I didn't tell anyone else, maybe I stood a better chance.
Anyway, no horse that year either, but I did get a wonderful gift : red cowgirl boots. Oh, how I loved those boots. I wore them everywhere. I can still feel them on my feet, still hear the satisfying click, click of the heels as I walked on hardwood floors. That gift affirmed my belief that Santa did know what lay in my heart, made becoming a cowgirl a legitimate wish. Heck, if Santa himself gives you cowgirl boots....well, can destiny be writ any larger? 2005/11/23 The day before ThanksgivingI've spent this early morning hour rearranging my blog space. I've tried all the different layouts and have finally settled on this one. I wanted the photos to be large, but more easily accessible; thus, putting them up on top.
I tried the different layouts where the blog paragraphs are narrower but find them hard to read. I like them to seem like an actual page of a book or something, I guess. Plus, when they're narrow, even fairly short blogs seem interminably long.
So, as the title says, this is the day before Thanksgiving. Why, then, am I chattering on about blog layouts? PRIORITIES, Barb, priorities! lol I'm one of those people who like things to be logically organized. I rearrange furntiture, fuss with flower arrangements, put a lot of time and thought into table setting.......and all the rest of it. When my environment seems "right" (by whatever inner standard is working at the moment) then I can concentrate on other things.......like Thanksgiving dinner.
Now don't laugh, but for the third year in a row we have purchased an entire dinner from Meijers, a Michigan grocery and variety store. For $29.95, we get a 12 lb turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, relish, rolls and a pie. Now that is a lot of food for the money, and a lot of the messy work already done by someone else. We just have to heat it up.
We tried this purchased dinner two years ago rather tentatively. I even had an emergency back-up turkey in the freezer just in case. But the meal was fabulous, and the clean up was so easy without all the prep work taking over the kitchen for two days. So this is our new tradition.
Oh, we still make some of our "signature" side dishes. I'll be cutting the apples for a Waldorf salad in a few minutes; Noel will do the candied sweet potatoes, etc. But we have a lot more time and energy with this new system; time and energy, I mean, for something besides cooking and washing large pans.
So while many are slaving away in their kitchens, I'll be walking in the woods with my grandchildren; arranging flowers for the table; shopping for books to take on the next plane ride. TIME. That's what I'm really purchasing, not just a turkey dinner, but time.
2005/10/31 Memories of HalloweenIf I were back in Michigan today, I would be helping with the parties in my grandchildren's school. And I would be in costume...a witch of course. Aren't all teachers witches? Or at least haven't you all had a few of whom you were certain that was true? Anyway, I'd have on my long purple wig and pointed black hat. Last year, when one of the children was looking at me warily, Emily said to her, "Don't worry. It's not a real witch; it's just my grandma." Ah, but we grandmas have powers few witches dream of.
Back in Coeymans, in upstate New York, Halloween was a big deal. This was the l940s and 50s, so we had no fears of danger on the streets or in the food. We wandered for a couple of hours up and down our narrow, hilly streets, knocking on every door, and receiving candy from every house. No one would have dared give a tootbrush to us. No... only candy, candy, candy.
We had several costumes which my sibs and I took turns wearing. The one I remember best was a beautiful silk robe one of my uncles had brought back from WWII. I loved the feel of that heavy, lined silk. The robe was covered with delicate embroidery. I can't imagine why it wasn't tucked away as the treasure it most surely was, but it wasn't, and we loved wearing it this one special time of the year.
Once we returned home with our loot, Bertie, Danny, Mary K., and I dumped it all on the table to be sorted, traded, and eaten. Oh, how we dug in and ate it! Mother let us gorge ourselves that one night. I never remember having a stomach ache as a result or being more hyper than usual. Of course, I was so hyperactive anyway it would have been hard to tell. Our family, in general, was pretty high energy, so hyper seemed normal to us.
How I would love to be able to gobble chocolate like that today without worrying about which hip it was going to go straight to. But at least I did have my gobbling, greedy days. What a glut of pleasure!
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