Slumber Party!

      Mom once mentioned that Eric had told her 1967 was the most significant year of his childhood because we had taken two vacations that year – the trip to Washington, D.C., and also later that summer we trekked back to Honey Harbor in the Georgian Bay of Lake Huron.

Honey Harbor 1967

        I guess, for me, starting with the summer of '66 through autumn '67 – it was a time jam-packed with stuff – the Girl Scout trip to Dearborn, Michigan, the Christmas when Mom gave Dad a pool table and he gave her a stereo; at Christmas also, I had my one and only slumber party with a few friends from my class, the next spring was church Confirmation, then trips to Washington and Honey Harbor, the whole year of sesquicentennial celebrations in our home town of Boston, New York, and then in the fall of '67, Dad began coaching little league football in town – the junior varsity, meaning the 6, 7, and 8 year old boys, while my brothers were on the varsity, the 9, 10, and 11 year olds – and Mom and I finally caught on to the rules of football from watching their games through September and October.

Two Boston Patriots!

        I can't remember if economically my parents were doing better – I doubt there was too much more money for spending since they were in the midst of all the house renovations. Perhaps it was just the age we kids were at that we were able to do more? I don't know.

        So what about the slumber party? Mom had a picture in her photo album of a group of girls in their pajamas. They are not sexy eighth-grade-girl-pajamas – just warm pjs – it was December, you know, in fact it was Christmas week.             And the girls in the picture are not facing the camera – the pic is of the back of pajama-clad girls. I think we were performing a levitation – something we did at all the slumber parties back then, and we had asked Mom to get a snapshot when we were levitating – I don't even know which one of us was getting levitated – and of course the picture does not show the levitated body – just the backs of several pajama-clad giggling girls.

        Levitation involved someone lying on her back while all the other girls crouched around her in a circle – we would do some incantations and then place our fingers under the person lying down; slowly we would stand up and the girl would rise with just our fingers lifting and holding her. It was kind of neat that it worked. My folks were not impressed.

        I can't remember what we ate or drank that night; we did camp out in sleeping bags in the living room and tried to stay up all night talking and laughing, and beside the levitations, I think we might have gotten out the Ouija board. Mom came halfway down the stairs around 3AM and asked nicely that we go to sleep. No one else's parents did that at other girls' slumber parties. Oh well.

202 20150721 Slumber Party

The Eagle Has Landed

     Whenever July 20^th rolls around, my brothers and I are reminded of a famly quote, “Did the other guy come down yet?”

     This, of course, as anyone might surmise, refers to the day humans stepped foot on the moon for the very first time, July 20^th, 1969.

     It was a Sunday. My grandfather has passed away less than a month before, and my Uncle John thought it would be a nice gesture to take his mother, my grandmother, to our house to spend the day, have dinner with family, and then we could all share the experience of the moon landing which would be televised.

     If it was a Sunday in July and we had company, then Dad would have been grilling – probably hot dogs or hamburgers, maybe steaks, but not chicken. Mom would have made the side dishes like potato salad and tossed salad and of course Mother Des Soye's Delicious Variation of Grandma Browns Baked Beans. And dinner was with Granny and Uncle John.

     And usually right after dinner and clean-up, Granny would be saying it was time to go. That's what old people do right? Have to go home early – don't stay out late, don't wear out one's welcome. (When I tell this story to an audience these days, I usually stop here and do the math – Granny was 66 years old in 1969 – so old to me at the time, not so ancient now that I have reached the same decade! - and the audience laughs, but I know what they are thinking - I am old too!)

     But that night, Granny did not say she had to go home right away.

     The Eagle had landed.

     Three days earlier, three astronauts from the United States had blasted off in a ship called Apollo 11. Their destination was the moon. Two days later they were in orbit around the moon, and on Sunday, a smaller ship emerged from Apollo 11 with two of the three astronauts aboard. It was the Eagle – the lunar lander! And slowly and surely it made its descent to the surface of the moon.

     When the Eagle landed – and what a great moment for all of us that was – there were cameras. The world was watching, waiting for the first astronaut to come out.

    We gathered around the television, excited, anxious, burning the memory of this occasion forever into our brains. The camera was such that we did not see the door open, but we could hear the astronauts talking, and we knew when Neil Armstrong emerged. Then we saw his foot on the rung of the ladder!

      He put his foot onto the moon! And he said

     “That's one small step for Man, one giant leap for mankind.”

     And Neil Armstrong started making more small steps on the moon as the world rejoiced and celebrated.

     The second astronaut would be following shortly.

     And we waited; and we waited.

     The television people replayed the blastoff of Apollo 11 and showed a simulation of the ship flying to the moon. They interviewed Mike Collins, the third astronaut who was taking care of the spaceship after the other two left in the Eagle. The television people replayed Neil Armstrong coming down the ladder to the moon, and they struggled over his first words – did he say “That's one small step for Man” or did he say “That's one small step for a man”? And does that make a difference in the meaning? And was it worthy enough for the first words of the first man on the moon? And would those words be remembered 40 years later and beyond?

     And still we waited for Buzz Aldrin, the second astronaut, to emerge from the Eagle.

     My Uncle John was a teamster, a truck driver. He drove truck every week night, from Buffalo, New York, to destinations 4 hours away – places like Cleveland, Ohio and Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Or Ashtabula. He drove 4 hours, traded loads, and then drove 4 hours back to Buffalo. And that would make up his 8 hour shift. Because my Uncle John drove at night, he slept during the day. And/or he would sleep whenever or whereever there was opportunity.

     And so while waiting for Buzz Aldrin to come out of the Eagle on that very momentous occasion of man first stepping onto the moon, that night in July 1969 in our living room, Uncle John fell asleep. After a few minutes, he roused himself, saw what was going on, and said, “Did the other guy come down yet?”

     We said, “No, not yet,” and Uncle John fell back to sleep.

     After about the third time that he woke up, we all started saying it with him, “Did the other guy come down yet?”

     And that was how the family saying came about – our own personal story to go with humanity's event of the moon landing.

     Finally, another foot was seen on the rung of the Eagle's ladder. Buzz Aldrin touched the surface of the moon and made his own giant leaps for mankind – in fact he leapt quite well since the gravity of the moon is so much less than that of earth.

     The astronauts talked to the rest of us the whole time about what they were seeing and thinking. They picked up rocks and scooped up moon dust to bring back to earth to study.

     And before they got back into the Eagle to blast off, hook up with Apollo 11 and fly safely back to all of us on earth, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left a plaque upon the moon to commemorate their having been there. The plaque reads in part, “We came in peace for all mankind”. How totally awesome is that?

Apollo 11 Moon Plaque

     Any night I can look in the sky here in Atlanta, Georgia and marvel that the moon that is shining on me is also shining on my brother in Scottsdale, Arizona and my other brother in Getzville, New York, and that makes me feel that we aren't really so far away. How the moon connects us all!

     And it is the same moon that was shining that night in 1969 when humans were bold enough to step foot on it – the night my Uncle was thoughtful enough to take his mother to spend the day with family and to share the moon landing event with all of us and to coin a new phrase that we could repeat for years to come.

     “Did the other guy come down yet?”

     And when we say it, we feel connected – to the past and the present, to each other, and we don't seem so far away.

201 201507120 The Eagle Has Landed

D.C. Vacation

 

A good time was had by all!

    The summer after I was in eighth grade, in 1967, the family drove to Washington, D.C. We walked to the top of the Washington Monument and walked to the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials.

     I seem to recall a tour of the Federal Mint building – there was a two way mirror that I found intriguing. We did the Smithsonian where the family stood behind a wax figure of Lyndon Johnson sitting at a desk, and we had our picture taken. LBJ was President at the time.

     We visited a couple of churches in town – I remember getting a charm for my charm bracelet at one of them – the churches were not in the city but rather out a ways where the view from each was beautiful.

     Besides doing a lot of walking, two things stand out about our trip to Washington even after all these years. One was the tour of the White House – we were standing in front of a roped off room with a lot of other tourists. I nudged Eric, and, totally provoked, he hit me – or rather, he strongly nudged me back. A police officer on the other side of the rope did not see what I had done, only what Eric had done, and the police officer gave Eric a bit of a lecture! Mom was mortified. Imagine Eric embarrassing the family like that in the White House! It was years before I confessed my part in the incident – which Mom would have realized all along if the public embarrassment had not been such a juicy story to repeat to all forever afterward.

     The second memorable incident also involved Eric. One night eating dinner in an affordable restaurant outside of D.C., my brother came back from the restroom laughing. When asked what was so funny, he said there was graffiti in the bathroom that said, “flush twice, it's a long way to the kitchen”!

     It was a long drive both to and from Washington – and Mom and Dad listened to different music on the radio while riding than the tunes that I preferred as a new teenager, which made the ride even longer. I remember when we were on the way home the song Up, Up, and Away by the 5^th Dimension came on the radio, it was in the top 40 at that time, and I was hoping Dad would not switch to another station. He let it play. Not one of those family memory instances where we all sang along. It was just the song on the radio, the wheels on the road, and the Des Soyes returning from a once in a lifetime vacation in the nation's capital!

200 20150719 D.C. Vacation

The Esso Bee

    One day, as a kid, I walked to the local drug store, and at the counter I saw a display of post cards. I got so excited! Post cards of North Boston? What pictures were on them? The town was so beautiful to me. What views would a photographer have found to make post cards of, and would I recognize them?

     The excitement soon faded as the post cards in the North Boston pharmacy were not of local scenes at all but rather they were generic – goofy messages that could be sent from anywhere.

     A particular post card stood out, however, and has stayed with me forever – I think about it every time I write a postcard these days.

     The front of the card had a deer. It was not a photo of a deer but rather more like a Disney deer. The deer did not have antlers, and it was moving toward the left side of the card, and its eyes were big – not cartoon big, but rather very wide open big. To the right of the deer on the postcard was a bear. The bear was on two legs following, maybe even running, after the deer. And at the bottom of the picture was the message: A little deer with a bear behind.

     !

     Well I was not expecting that!

     Later I told Mom about the postcard.

     She told me to watch my mouth!

     While writing out cards last week when we were in Vermont, I told Clark about the little deer with a bear behind and Mom's reaction to it.

     Clark said that when he was in grade school, a classmate asked him one day, “what kind of bee flies from gas station to gas station?” and the answer to the riddle was “an Esso bee”.      Toby said he told Mom the riddle when he got home. And Mom told him to watch his mouth! It was a few years later when Clark figured out Esso bee/SOB and why Mom said what she said.

     Every town should have its own postcards – they could be pictures of the scenery, or local restaurants, or the annual festivals, or the historical markers, or the old timers, or the Esso gas stations – I would buy them!

199 20150718 The Esso Bee

Dad's Birthday

     Today is my Dad's birthday. He would have been 86. Mom would have said, “Oh he would not have liked turning 86!” We would have liked it though, having the Old Man around to show off our kids and grandkids to him and let him know that between our cousins and all our offspring – the Des Soyes have done good – those eight kids, my Dad and his five brothers and two sisters, grew up from such auspicious beginnings to have brought children of their own into this world who are successful and talented and wondrous lights upon the land – they done good!

     We used to tease Dad mercilessly on his birthday. When we got our cats Gomez and Morticia as kittens right after they were weaned – we estimated the date of their birth as eight weeks earlier, which worked out to be July 17^th! Morticia was not around for her first birthday – but Gomez was with us for 10 years – and we jokingly made Dad share his birthday with the cat.

     It was also the birthday of Daryle Lamonica – the quarterback for years for the Oakland Raiders and backup quarterback before that for the Buffalo Bills. One of Dad's famous quotes is about Lamonica (I'm saving it for the 1^st of August) – so Lamonica was a household name in our family, and Dad was a fan. But when we found out they shared the same birthday, I don't think Dad was too thrilled with that.

     On my father's 50^th birthday, I was living in my own apartment in Buffalo – my parents and brothers and a couple of his friends were asked over for a modest celebration. I wanted to make the day special without making Dad feel old. (He wouldn't have liked turning 50!)          On his 60^th birthday, Mom and Dad were living in Florida, and we did not do anything special. My brothers asked about doing something for the 60^th – but we were all so far away and busy with jobs and not much money. We let it slip by thinking the special celebration could be saved for another birthday instead -

     And another birthday never came along.

     So don't let those chances to celebrate slip away!

198 20150717 Dad's Birthday

The Knees and The Elbows

     A few days into my freshman year of college, a girl who had been in my orientation group and who was also in many of my classes since we were both biology majors, approached me and said she had a joke to tell me. This was kind of odd – the girl seemed very shy, why would she go out of her way to tell me a joke?

               A woman who was expecting a baby went to the hospital when she went into                 labor.  She and her husband were very surprised and excited when two babies were             born instead of just one – twins! A boy and a girl.

             The Dad's brother asked if he could name the twins? The new Mom and new Dad            smiled when the new uncle asked because he was mentally challenged, and they                  could not imagine what names he would come up with for the babies.

             “For the girl,” the uncle said, “her name can be Denise.”

             The Mom and the Dad looked at each other and nodded, “Denise is a lovely name            for the baby girl. What about the boy?”

             And the new uncle replied, “De-nephew.”

     So that was why the classmate wanted to tell me the joke! Because my name is Denise.      And that was the first time I had ever heard it.

     And every time someone has told me that joke since then, nigh on forty-four years now, I usually respond, “Wow! That's the first time I've heard that one!”

     On our family reunion to Buffalo and Vermont last week, my brother, Eric, at one point referred to me as “De-knees and De-elbows.”

     And that made me laugh.

197 20150716 The Knees and The Elbows

Frodo the * * Hobbit

   One more story my brother Eric says I need to include in the memory-a-day blog. And this has a spoiler for anyone who might not have read the Lord of the Rings trilogy or seen the movies.

     In the summer of 1975, just after college graduation and while looking for a job – I was reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Eric had started reading it first – so he was in one book while I was in an earlier one.

2015 There and Back Again

     After Eric finished, he would tease me about what was happening and make stuff up – I would believe some of the things he said and then be surprised when they did not come to pass. And there were other things that I told him were too far-fetched for me to give any credence to whatsoever.

     Like the part about the nine-fingered Hobbit! Oh my gosh, how outrageous could he get – Gollum biting off Frodo's finger – ew! How could Eric's imagination come up with such gruesome stuff? Eric laughed. He said that there was a song the Hobbits would sing after the adventure was long over – the song about the nine-fingered Hobbit. And I expressed more outrage that Eric would expect me to believe such nonsense.

     So you can imagine my mortification to realize that this did indeed come to pass. And duh, there really was no other way for the ring to have gotten into the fire.

     And you can imagine Eric's amusement and satisfaction over all of this.

196 20150715 Nine-fingered Hobbit

Can't Wait Until Tomorrow

   

Mr. Flexible met us at the Buffalo airport

 One night in Buffalo in the late 1970's, brother Eric and I went to see Marcel Marceau downtown. We had seats way in the back of the theater – it was hard to see. As Marcel moved across the stage, I would move from one side of my seat to the other depending on whose head in front of me was in the way.

     At one point, Eric leaned down and said in a whisper, “Can you hear anything?”

     Eric remembers this anecdote so much better than I do – it is barely a flicker of a memory to me even after being reminded of the incident by Eric. I laughed then, and I laugh now, of course, because you see Marcel Marseau was a mime. (He was also the only one who spoke in Woody Allen's Silent Movie – another irony I seem to remember much better than the night I saw Mr Marceau in person!)

     Father's Day was just a couple of weeks ago. Eric said he asked his daughter, Bethany, if she had any pearls of wisdom she had gained from her Dad. Bethany could not think of any off-hand. So Eric asked his middle child, Gabriel, if he had any pearls of wisdom learned from his Dad. Gabe needed no time to think at all as he blurted out three separate statements:

     “Don't ask, we will offer.”

     “Go to the back of the park and start there.”

     “I can't wait for tomorrow..........because I get better looking every day.”

     The first one – don't ask, we will offer – is kind of like my Mom's saying don't be asking for anything whenever we went out.

     The second statement has to do with amusement parks like Disney – if you get there when the park opens and go to the far end and work your way back toward the front while riding the rides and seeing the attractions you will stand in shorter lines. Eric figured this out long ago and has shared this wisdom – Gabe has been to Disney World a few times with family and with friends – and has followed this advice with much satisfaction.

     The third statement I can't wait for tomorrow because I get better looking every day – is pure Dad, Eric's Dad and mine. I can see and hear Dad saying it; I can see and hear Eric saying it. And I can see and hear Gabriel. They own it in each his own way.

     Such a classic.

     And I had heard this story during our trip to Buffalo and then Vermont. At that point, Eric's oldest, Ben, had driven from Chicago with his wife, Caitlyn, to join us for the family reunion, and Eric asked Ben if he had any pearls of wisdom learned from his father.

     Ben immediately said:

     “I'm watching and learning” which is pure Eric with a little bit of our Dad's “Look them over real good before you marry them!”

     And, “I'm Mr. Flexible,” something I do not think either of our parents would have ever said – but it does apply to Eric very well, and because Ben said it so readily, I think it is a philosophy Ben abides as well.

     Mr. Flexible. So it is okay that Eric could not hear Marcel Marceau that night – perhaps that is where the watching and learning way of life came about!

195 20150714 Can't Wait Until Tomorrow

Chinchilla Business

     In the course of this past week spent with my brothers and significant others on vacation in Getzville, New York and Arlington, Vermont, I have been told to be sure to include particular stories in the memory-a-day blog.

     There is the classic tale of the chinchillas at the Erie County Fair. Mom and Dad took us to the Erie County Fair every year. The fairgrounds were nearby in Hamburg – also the site of the Buffalo Raceway, although we never went to the horse races. The fair was held in August which was always hot – Dad would park in the parking lot, and as we got out of the car smelling the smells and hearing the noises of the fair, Mom would say, “Don't be asking for anything!” followed up with, “We are going to look at everything, and the midway will be last – but you will only go on the rides if you have not been whining about 'when are we going on the rides?'”

     I would think we were in for a boring day waiting to get to the midway. But ultimately, it was fun going past the tractor displays and the kitchen utensil demonstrations – really! The livestock tents were neat – all the different kinds of chickens there are – and all on display! The pigs, cows, sheep didn't look too different from other pigs, cows and sheep – but they were still neat to look at too. I did not much understand the blue ribbons that were awarded for pies and jams and such – the Ladies' Home Bureau area with the women there knitting or sewing and smiling – I was kind-of sure that would not be my thing when I grew up.

     One time, when I was about 8 we were on stools at one of the food concessions early in the day – so I don't know if we were just taking a break or actually getting some drinks, but a man was passing out what looked like business cards. I stuck out my hand for him to give me a card at the same time that Dad was nudging me not to stick out my hand. The man gave me one of the cards, and it said, in essence, “I am deaf, could you help me out with a donation in exchange for this card?” I could read it well enough and sat there stunned. Finally the man motioned for me to give him back the card and he walked away. Dad leaned over and said, “are you embarrassed enough now?”

     And the midway, when we finally arrived, had so much for the eyes and the ears to take in. I liked the roller coaster and ferris wheels. When waiting for the roller coaster to fill up with passengers, I could hear the recording for the freak show and I could see the sign for the man who could put nails through his cheeks. For me that was the creepy part of the fair – people who would pay money to gawk at freaks, surely that has to be a sin? Once in a while we would play the games – but quickly we realized they were a waste of our money for prizes that weren't worth anything even if we did manage to knock a bottle over or shoot a duck or dunk the clown.

    And most years we did actually eat at the fair – there was a church that served barbeque chicken dinners and the church always had the prime spot with picnic tables and benches – and that was where we would eat. Mom and Dad usually did not trust barbeque chicken – worried it was not cooked fully enough – but I guess at the fair, the chance to sit in somewhat comfort while eating outweighed the risk of undercooked chicken.

     Anyway, there was one year at the fair when Eric was about four years old, and we were in one of the buildings that has displays of new things that are out – usually demonstrations of sharp knives or newfangled vacuum cleaners. An animal in a cage caught Eric's eye, and he started chatting with the people standing there. The animal in the cage was a chinchilla.       The display was for people who might want to raise chinchillas. At your own home, you could receive one of these pets as babies – then you would raise it, feed it, take care of it until it was a certain age or perhaps size, then you would get money for the chinchilla which would then be taken away and replaced, if you wanted, with a new baby chinchilla. Eric found this fascinating. Who wouldn't want such a great deal? A cool pet that sounded like people would pay for you to have? No one pays you to have a dog or a cat (neither of which we had at the time) – but you can get paid to have chinchillas!

     Eric asked what they do with the chinchillas when they buy them from you? And matter-of-factly he was told that they make coats with them. So they shave them? Well, no, the fur is on the skin when they make coats.

     “You kill the chinchillas?”

     His four-year-old outrage could be heard throughout the building – almost louder than the sounds of the fair going on outside.

     And he marched out ahead of us – thoroughly disgusted.

     Plans for the chinchilla farm were short-lived, but the story has lasted forever.

194 20150713 Chinchilla Business

Swinging a Dead Cat

     When Sarah was a school librarian, one of her most requested stories by the students was Jack the Cat. This is a true story of something that happened when Sarah was in high school. My version of the story is slightly different – not at all contradictory, merely a telling of events from Mom's point of view – and here it is officially.

     It was a December school day. For some reason that I cannot remember now, try as I might, I was taking the day off from work. Sarah had gone to school on the bus, but I was giving Amanda a ride to her middle school that morning. We were on Riverside on our way to Lawrenceville-Suwanee Road riding in the left lane.

     We both saw it – on the far left side of the road, a cat began to run across. I slowed down. But the car riding next to me in the right lane did not slow down, and the cat got hit.

Amanda gasped.

     I looked in the rear view mirror and saw the cat go bounding up the incline on the right side of the road. We heard the impact, but then I swear the cat looked okay as it ran up the little hill afterward.

     We got to school. But Amanda did not move!

     “You are upset about the cat?”

     She nodded yes.

     “You would like to go back and make sure it is okay?”

     Again a nod yes.

     “Well, you have to go to school. I'll tell you what – if I promise to go back past where we saw the cat get hit, and I look to see if it is all right, will you go into school?”

      Amanda nodded yes, and slowly she was able to open the door and exit the car and begin her school day.

     There were no qualms about my going back to the scene – I had witnessed the cat going up the little hill on the side of the road. It was okay and would be long gone by the time I would get back there for a look around. I would have kept my promise to Amanda and I would not have to deal with a wounded cat and hopefully, the cat was all right! Good deed done for the day.

     I got to the place on Riverside where the cat was hit, I turned the car around and parked.

There, on the side of the road, on the curb, not at all on the little hill next to the road, and shockingly not out of sight and out of mind, was the cat, curled up in a sleeping position, and quite dead.

     It is tough to hit a cat with a car and have it be okay afterward.

     Now what was I going to do?

     If I told Amanda later that the cat was dead but that I left it there on the road, she would be very upset with me.

     If I moved the cat, then its owners would never find it and know that it was dead – closure was important, you know.

     If I left the cat, more things might happen to it on the side of the road there. How could I just leave it like that? Yet what business did I have with someone else's dead cat?

     I walked over to the trunk of the car and I said to myself, “if there is something in the trunk that will allow me to pick up the cat with something other than my bare hands, then I will take the cat home. Otherwise, I'll leave it here and bear the consequences of Amanda's wrath afterward.

     When I opened the car trunk, there was a huge beach towel staring at me.

     It was a sign.

     Not a particularly welcome sign, but an answer nonetheless. Whoever owned the cat was never going to know what became of it. I picked up the dead cat on the side of the road with the beach towel and took it home.

     At home, I put the cat in a cardboard box and placed the box on the backyard patio.

     Sarah was the first one home that day. I told her the story of what had happened and explained that Amanda would probably want to bury the cat. When Sarah tells the story, she says that this is when she knew that she herself would be digging a hole in the backyard that day.

     As soon as Amanda walked in the house, the first thing she said was, “What about the cat, Mom?” I was half hoping that if she had forgotten all about it, I would not have to mention the cat myself. I told her the cat had died and then quickly offered Amanda the chance to bury it.

     Amanda looked into the box on the patio and christened the cat, Jack.

     The girls went to the backyard and spent the rest of the afternoon with the burial. Sarah says there were many factors involved in the difficulty of this task: it was December so the ground was harder from the cold; it was red Georgia clay in the upper level of the backyard which had not been disturbed since the beginning of time - hard red clay; there were tree roots everywhere, defying any of the tools once the hard red clay was so arduously moved.

     The shovel was not doing the trick, so Sarah surveyed the supplies in the garage and took the pick ax to the back yard. She swung with the pick ax, and Amanda used a shovel to move away whatever the ax had loosened.

     Finally there was a hole – deep enough on one side, and deep enough on another side, but right through the middle was a tree root that was not going to budge (thankfully there was not dynomite in the garage to work with!) and it was decided that with Jack's body draped over the tree root, his head and front legs would point downward into the first hole and his back legs and tail would point into the second hole! Covering him up with dirt again, there was only a slight hump where he was over the tree roots, and with branches and leaves, the entire grave was covered over and hopefully no wild animals would happen by and dig Jack up.

     The girls bowed their heads and said a brief prayer for Jack.

     We cannot find the exact spot in the backyard now where Jack was buried – so we can comfortably say he has returned to nature, and hopefully his family can find some closure in that – should they ever hear the story.

     As Sarah says so well when she tells the story, “Jack, you have lived longer in your death than we ever knew you when you were alive!”

193 20150712 Swinging a Dead Cat

Telling it Her Way

    

Memories of my daughters' school days and bus riding always brings to mind this particular story. It must have been a day when there were no after-school activities, so I was still at the lab and the girls would have taken their respective buses home. When I called home to check in, Sarah answered the phone and told me about her day. Then the following conversation took place:

     “Mom, you know when the bus turns off of our road, there's an extra lane for a while?”

     “Sarah, tell me everyone is okay and then tell me what happened.”

     “There's a lane when you turn right off of our road that then merges with the road?”

     “Sarah! Tell me everyone is okay!”

     “The bus this morning turned – you know that lane, Mom?”

     “Sarah Beth! You know the rules! Is everyone okay?
     “Mom! Let me tell the story my way!”

     The rules were that if there was a car/vehicular accident that either girl wanted to talk about, and everyone was okay, then the story has to begin with the announcement that everyone was all right before putting the listener through the agony of wondering who got hurt and how badly.

     But apparently new rules were evolving, ones involving storytelling. And Sarah wanted to emphasize her need to tell her story her own way!

     I had to give in, listen patiently while holding the phone, and trust that everyone was all right. (One day I told this story at a workshop and stopped at this point – the people in the workshop were almost hostile toward me as more than one of them said, “Well, was everyone all right?”)

     Yes, everyone was okay.

     When the bus had turned right off of our street that morning and was in the lane that merged with Atkinson, it ran into a car stalled in the lane. I don't think it did any damage to the car – just nudged it before the bus driver saw it sitting there. But it was excitement enough for the kids on the bus. Everyone was all right, and Sarah shared the story.

     This picture is of Sarah from the very first time she signed up for open mike at the Magnolia Storytelling Festival in Roswell, Georgia years after the bus incident – I think it was 2001, so she was almost 17. Sarah told the story of Jack and the Purple Bogies – a tale she had first heard from the wonderful nationally known storyteller, Jim May.

     But as you might imagine – we all let her tell the story her way!

192 Telling the Story Her Way

Face in the Window

   When I was nine years old, my mother went back to work. She had been a legal secretary before her children were born – and nine years after her first child came into this world, Mom lucked out when she found a new legal secretary position only a half a mile from our house! Mom began work for the only lawyer in North Boston, and his office was at the corner of Zimmerman and the old 219. For the first year, she walked to and from work every day, and then eventually she and Dad bought a second car.

     The plan, when Mom began her job, was that Clark and I would come home from school every day to the empty house – the door would be unlocked, and Eric, who was still a pre-schooler would come home from the neighbor's house. It was hoped that we could manage all right for ourselves for the hour and one half until Mom got home about 4:30. And even though I myself would have preferred to have my mother at home every afternoon, and I would also have preferred her presence with us in the mornings (after a while she slept in until we were all on our way to school) – this worked out. As the oldest I was technically in charge – a job I took way too seriously (and still do whenever I'm told I'm in charge) – so things weren't always smooth – but there were no deaths!

     The year that Sarah started middle school and Amanda was in third grade, 1995, we tried an experiment to see if they could get themselves ready for school in the mornings without any parental supervision. I was a single Mom at that point, and my preferable work schedule was to go into the lab very early and leave around 2 in the afternoon, hoping to compensate for the morning absence by taking them to any and all after-school activities.          So it was important for Sarah and Amanda to be able to get themselves up, fed, dressed, and to the bus stops at their respective times on their own - because if they could not – I would have to be there with them in the mornings, and then I would either have to give up their afternoon activities, or I would have to work less than 8 hour work days – perhaps making the hours up on the weekends, or else working less than full-time.

     We tried for a few days to see how the girls would do on their own. I remember calling the house twice each morning to make sure each girl was up. And to my surprise, this actually worked very well! (Not that this would work ideally for all families, I would readily acknowledge!) So we continued this schedule and quickly got into a workable routine.

     On weekday mornings, I would get up early, shower and dress. And before I went out the door, I would go to each girl's room and give them each a kiss. The kiss was enough to rouse Sarah. Both their bedrooms were over the garage – with a window from each bedroom above the garage doors.

     A minute or so later, as I was backing out of the driveway, I would see two slats of the vertical blinds in Sarah’s room part – and her little head would be just above the window sill. She would be kneeling on the floor because she was so tired, just barely awake – and she would give me a wave as I drove away!

     Many times I told Sarah she did not have to get out of bed to wave good-bye to me. But she did it every day. Until she graduated high school and moved away.

     And now every morning when I back out of the driveway to go to work – I look up in the window at the vertical blinds – and I remember the sweet little girl who was so compelled to get up and wave good-bye to me no matter how far from awake she was – heck, I can almost see her there still.

     And the rewards of being a Mom flow over me again and again, with that simple act every single morning!

191 20150710 Face in the Window

Higher Level Math

     A story in the unexpected gifts department. One year when Sarah was in middle school – her math class was pre-algebra. One afternoon, the teacher gave them a challenge problem – totally optional – and the students could use any resource at their disposal to figure it out.

     Sarah promptly handed the challenge problem to me when she got home – she said I was an allowable resource! So I sat down with the problem and recognized it as algebra – which I had always liked in school. I quickly realized that the problem was a quadratic equation, and then I just as quickly realized that I could not remember how to solve a quadratic equation!

     I started the challenge over and over again – always getting to the same spot and then stuck. I told Sarah I was going to figure it out. I was. And I started it all over again. While I wrote down steps that I knew were going to get me to the same stuck place, I tried to think of resources at my disposal that would help me solve the problem.

     And finally I remembered that there is an algebra textbook on my bookshelf – it was published in 1891! But quadratic equations are older than that - so the solution should be somewhere in those pages! Right?

1891 Algebra Textbook

     With much hope, I found the book – and soon I had solved the problem for Sarah.

     She said, “redo all the steps Mom, and explain each one to me so I can write them on the board for everyone in class tomorrow!” Sarah was very excited.

the secret to quadratics

     When we were done going over all the steps, I looked around and saw that evening had come! It was dark outside, and it was dark inside the house everywhere except where at some point I must have turned on a lamp at the table where I was working. Hours had gone by! Neither of the girls had had any dinner! What kind of example was I being to my children to put everything else aside to bullheadedly, stubbornly pursue something like that - to give them the impression that something else was more important than taking care of my children and for goodness sakes, more important than feeding them?

     Months went by. The same math teacher gave Sarah's class an assignment to make an ABC book with math terms. Sarah did her book and handed it in.

     At the end of the school year, when kids had to clean out their lockers, Sarah brought home a whole pile of papers, and I took a glance through them. One of the things in the stack was the ABC book of math terms which had been returned and then stashed in the locker. I turned to the first page and saw that it was a Dedication Page. I thought that surely the teacher did not require such a page – Sarah must have done that independently. My curiosity piqued – did she dedicate the book to her sister? One of the cats? A friend?

     The Dedication Page said that the book was dedicated to my Mom who taught me higher level math.

     “Sarah Beth!” I exclaimed, “When did I teach you higher level math?”

     “Remember that night, Mom, you helped me with the algebra problem?”

     “You mean the night I stubbornly sat at the table for hours and did not feed you until I had figured out the quadratic equation?”

     “Yes, Mom, you taught me higher level math.”

190 20150709 Higher Level Math

Two Hundred Pages

One of the family classics – told often and dedicated today to daughter Sarah whose birthday was yesterday

     My daughters and I have read together since before they were born. In the womb they heard Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein among many more wonderful authors; after the girls were born, we read the likes of Winnie the Pooh and Tom Sawyer, Anne of Green Gables and Treasure Island. Every other spring we shared The Hobbit, and of course, every December, The Christmas Carol.

     When the girls were both in grade school, I thought maybe they were old enough that I could introduce to them.....Chick Lit! And being the wise and wonderful mother that I am, I thought, why not share with my daughters, the best that Chick Lit has to offer?

     And so it was with Sarah in fifth grade and Amanda in second grade that the three of us sat down together to read.....Jane Eyre!

     And the girls loved the story right from the very beginning. Because at the beginning, Jane was a little girl, and Sarah and Amanda were little girls!

     “Wow Mom! What happens next?”

     Well,..... Jane's parents died.

     “Oh! That would be terrible!.....What happens next?”

     Jane's relatives took her in, but then she was quickly shipped off to boarding school where Jane was told to go to school every day, study hard, do well, and someday she could get a good job and support herself.

     “Wow!” said Sarah and Amanda. Their parents said the exact same things to them every single day!

     “What happens next?”

     Jane did study hard and did do well, and she got a good job. Jane became a governess at a mansion owned by a man named Rochester.

     Ah tall, dark, and mysterious Rochester!

     Every scene between Jane and Rochester crackled with electricity! It was obvious they were attracted to each other. But they were from from two different worlds!

     Every conversation between Jane and Rochester was filled with intelligence and wit. They were falling in love! Could it happen?

     One day Sarah came home from school and said, “Mom, we have to read the next chapter of Jane Eyre right now!” Sarah's class was going on a field trip, and they were going to be away for two days and two nights. Sarah said she thought Rochester might propose to Jane in the next chapter, and she wanted to know before leaving on the field trip.

     So the three of us read the next chapter of Jane Eyre, and sure enough, Rochester asked Jane to marry him, and Jane, said “yes”!

     I looked over at Sarah, and she had the biggest most satisfied grin on her face! She said, “Now I can go on my field trip knowing that Jane and Rochester are going to get married.”

     Being the wise and wonderful mother that I am, I just had to take this as what they nowadays refer to as a teachable moment, and I grabbed what was still left in the book to read, and I said, “Sarah, there are over 200 pages left in this story to read! Do you really think Jane and Rochester are going to get married now? Or do you think that just maybe there are 200 pages of trials and tribulations for them to go through before the end of the book when they may or may not get married?”

     Sarah's smile disappeared, and she looked at me with all seriousness and said, “I know where you are going with this, Mom,” and then with much conviction she continued, “but I firmly believe that two people can fall in love, get married, and have 200 pages of happy adventures!”

     Being the wise and wonderful Mom that I am, I decided to let things go at that comment.

     Sarah went on her field trip, and when she returned, she found out soon enough that Jane and Rochester did indeed have 200 pages of trials, tribulations, and major drama before the very last page where they got married and lived happily ever after.

     Sharing Jane Eyre with my two daughters was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. 

     And now it has been more than 20 years since we read Jane Eyre together, and being the wise and wonderful Mom that I am, I have come to realize that in those twenty years, this story has acquired a new ending.

     It turns out that Sarah was right all along!

     Because you see, in the real world, Sarah and Amanda went to school every day, worked hard, did well, and today they both have phenomenal careers.

     And also in this real world, Sarah and Amanda each has met her own Rochester, fallen in love, and gotten married.

    And now, Sarah and John, Amanda and Tony – are living their 200 plus pages of happy adventures!

189 20150708 Two Hundred Pages

Happy Birthday Sarah Beth Nelson!!

     On the occasion of the birthday today of my darling daughter Sarah, I am posting this story that I wrote last year about Sarah's milestone birthday.

     Sarah turned 30 this week – July the 7^th. In the days leading up to Sarah's birthday, one story kept rolling over and over in my mind. It had to do with my own 30^th birthday. My parents had been living in Florida for about 3 years, but they were in town around the time of my birthday – visiting all the Buffalo relatives. Mom was at the table in my Grandmother's house, the two of them drinking cup after cup of hot tea, Mom and Granny; and at some point Mom said she had gotten me something special for my 30^th birthday!

     Mom said that she felt so terrible about having a child who was turning 30, that she had to buy herself some gold so she could feel better again. And she showed me a beautiful gold bracelet that she had purchased for herself – it was on Mom's left wrist and looked lovely. Of course, as soon as Mom bought the bracelet she realized how awkward it was that she purchased something so valuable for herself on the occasion of her daughter's 30^th birthday – and Mom went back to the store and got me a matching gold bracelet. And that was my present. I still have it, and it is still beautiful.

My 30 Bracelet

     And so it would of course follow that I had to get a bracelet for Sarah for her 30^th birthday, right? The tradition had to continue!

     I am not one to frequent jewelry stores, and I certainly do not know prices. After stopping by a couple of places and feeling completely lost, I remembered that Mike and I got our wedding bands at a place in Discover Mills – now Sugarloaf Mills, a mall by our house, and it was not that uncomfortable an experience. So I ended up there, looking over the offerings at Zales.

     Was the bracelet the way to go, or would any piece of jewelry qualify to continue the tradition? Sarah has a platinum wedding band – I wondered if gold would look all right, or if something else would be a better match for her?

     Inside the bracelet display case, I saw what I thought was perfect – in fact, I was sure I would not find anything else I would like as much for this special occasion. It was not platinum, but it was not all gold – it was a silver and gold mix. Soon it was on a pillow, in a box, in a Zales bag. Tears popped into my eyes - this was so emotional!.

Sarah's 30 Bracelet

     I didn't see Sarah on her actual birthday, but two days later, Sarah was telling a story at an event called the Rabbit Box at the Melting Point in Athens. I was there as her guest, and I got to sit in the front row of an audience of about 300 people!

     Sarah told the story of her Cinderella dress – a story that perfectly illustrates the incredible woman she has become!

     And the crowd loved her!

     We had a hotel room for the night in Athens, and Sarah suggested we go to Applebys, next to the hotel, for dinner.

     Each of us ordered a margarita, and toasted to another wonderful storytelling event. And we toasted Sarah's 30^th birthday. 

    Then I told her the story of the gold bracelet that Mom gave me for my 30^th birthday, and from my purse I gave Sarah the bag that held the box that held the pillow that held a 30 bracelet for her.

     She loves the bracelet and the story!

Both 30 Bracelets

     And there is a little bit more to the older part of this story. Mom got the bracelet for my 30^th birthday after getting a bracelet for herself to feel better for having a child over 30 years old. Three years later, my brother, Clark, turned 30, and two years after that, my brother, Eric, my parents' youngest child, turned 30. Eric asked Mom where his gold was? If Mom had felt bad when her oldest hit 30, then she must have been really down in the dumps when her youngest reached 30! What did she buy for herself, and what was she going to give him? I don't think there was any gold involved in Eric's thirtieth birthday – and I do not know what Clark's thoughts were on the subject.

     But, Amanda, be sure that the tradition will continue on your 30^th, and Virginia – hopefully for your 30^th also!

Daughter and Mother 30 Bracelets

187 20150707 Happy Birthday Sarah

Chicken Feed

 

what stays in the yard!

  These are my chicken feeders! They are supposed to each have a flat tray beneath them – but those dishes are no more, having cracked and broken over the years. I did not get these from an antique store or an auction or garage sale. They were in the barns when we moved in to the house on Zimmerman in 1965, They were used to feed the chickens way back when.

     There had been yard sales at the house when the farmer lady was selling everything. And not everything sold – and stuff was left behind in the barns which we rummaged through – it was not a lot of stuff – but all treasures to us!

from Zimmerman Road

     I think there had been six feeders which Mom then put in different areas of the yard for decoration. Years later when she and Dad moved to Florida – I took possession of the feeders – which is weird when I think about it because we were in an apartment then – so where did I store the chicken feeders? Most likely in the storage area of the apartment basement lined with, you guessed it, chicken wire!

     Well, the feeders have come with me to every home – the yard in Alden, New York, the rented place and then the house near Bartlesville, Oklahoma, the rented place and then house in Plano, Texas, and the rented house and then home for the last 23 years here in Lawrenceville, Georgia.

     No one has ever come into the yard to steal them – I guess they are not worth too much.  

    And I'm glad because they are worth a lot to me and I would miss them if they were gone or vandalized.

     And I hope they stay in the family after I am gone – as a token of something from our old farmhouse on Zimmerman and all that it had meant to us!

187 20150706 Chicken Feed

The Foliated Fort

   

Metal Man went to the Metal Man

 Well, my intentions are always good, but I had to admit to myself ages ago that I am not much of a gardener. My skills seem to be in the buying of the bulbs, not in the planting of them – the bulbs end up sprouting in the garage months or years after their purchase.

     Every year I buy three or four pumpkins for the front yard – they don't get carved, just sit there for autumnal display until after Thanksgiving when they are moved to the backyard and we watch them slowly sink upon themselves – sometimes the next spring some pumpkin plants start to grow from the seeds, but they don't live for very long.

     Except that one summer when we were at the rented house here in Georgia – 1991, I think – when some pumpkin seeds I actually put in the ground myself sprouted, and the vines spread all across the backyard! They were beautiful and the girls' father didn't even complain about them – he had an excuse not the mow the backyard – there was no grass that season. Alas, we did not yield any pumpkins – they started to grow on the vines, but quickly shriveled in the heat.

     A patch of wild flowers grew in one corner near the house also that summer – seeds from a can like they used to sell – guaranteed to grow! They were beautiful, and as tall as the pumpkin vines were long. I guess that was a good summer.

     At this house, I mostly buy hanging plants each summer and put them around the backyard. Anything that looks like it should be a flower bed has nothing in it but the aforementioned good intentions.

     And so that is how it came to be that I thought the backyard could maybe be a habitat instead of a garden. We have a tiny front yard that I mow and think of Pleasant Valley Sunday when I do; and we have a tiny strip of a backyard which then meets some railroad ties which takes the yard to a higher level and another thin patch of land – this has always had trees on it, and possiblities.

     The treed area is where I wanted to create the habitat. I put debris from the rest of the yard there – grass clippings, leaves, pine cones; and several old Christmas trees were on their side back there. I used to put hair from my hairbrush out there on the Christmas tree branches until I realized it was never getting claimed for nests or lairs.

     What kind of animals was I hoping for? The birds are always welcome and colorful. The neighborhood would be too dangerous for deer, but I thought perhaps some rabbits might nest in the yard, or chipmunks or squirrels. There are plenty of squirrels, and they seem to live in the trees. Chipmunks are less plentiful but more fun to watch – until the day I saw a hawk swoop down and eat a chipmunk in the yard!

     For a few days one summer I was watching a rabbit, and then I saw him flat splat in the middle of the road in front of the house – I threw him back in the habitat before Amanda saw him (sorry, Bodie), and no rabbits have been in the back yard since then.

    Under one of the bird feeders and beneath the railroad ties, we have seen the occasional rat family. For some reason I am not as entertained by rats as by chipmunks.

     But still the idea of a habitat is cool – it fits with my all natural hippie persona. Over a decade, yard debris continued to pile up, and the trees grew taller and denser, but the wildlife was few.

     Then Mike entered the picture and things began to change. He suggested we get rid of the Christmas trees – having a truck made that an easy request. But the rest of the backyard remained about the same.

A really cool fort been it would have!

     Mike had some bed springs from an old twin bed. He has sentimental attachment to almost all of his stuff – so I was surprised when he said that the bed springs could go to the dump! I sheepishly asked if I could put them in the backyard – and he okayed it!

     I set it up sideways hoping vines would start to grow over and cover it. When the lawn got mowed I would throw debris into the backyard and then put branches and sticks into the springs – and I'd think maybe more rabbits would move into the yard soon.

     And I hoped the springs would grow covered in foliage so that the grandchildren could play in the yard and be creative with the wall of bed springs sitting there just for them – a fort, a hiding spot, a castle wall!!

     Yeah, Mike did not like the springs in the backyard. Not classy.

     Last summer I had many of the trees cut down – I had wanted to get rid of the pines lest they topple onto the house during a storm – but the tree guy cut down almost all the trees back there.

      And Mike said the springs needed to get thrown away – they were much too visible, hence an embarrassing eyesore to him, without the trees.

     He also made me take out all the sticks and greenery.

defoliated for the Metal Man

     I called him names like Pleasant Valley Sunday, and on the next trash day, Mike chased down the guy who looks over the garbage on the streets for metal – and the metal man took the springs.

     So what are we going to do with the yard now that the trees are gone?

     Likely more good intentions.

186 20150705 The Foliated Fort

Mary in the Morning

     A new tradition came into being not too long after Mom's stereo arrived at the house. It took place on Sunday mornings. As mentioned a few times earlier, Dad took his three kids to church every Sunday. It was not an easy task getting all of us ready and out the door each week – especially when we were young. As we got older and were able to get ourselves ready, it became more difficult to get us out of bed – teens like their sleep, you know.

      For some reason, who knows why, I am an early riser – so getting up early any day of the week was never a problem for me – but my brothers, they liked to sleep, and who could blame them for wanting to stay abed on a Sunday morning?

     Dad thought he had come up with a perfect solution – something that would avoid nagging his sons – Dad made breakfast on Sunday mornings! Often he made pancakes on a griddle (purchased with coupons from Raleigh cigarettes years before) and bacon – other Sundays he made eggs and bacon and toast (the butter was always too hard for me to spread on the toast – I was never much good for anything). Dad thought the smell of breakfast cooking would be enough to lure the boys to the breakfast table without him having to wake them up and/or drag them out of bed.

     But the smell of breakfast was not enough to get my brothers up. The sound of breakfast being made in the kitchen was not enough to get them up. Sleeping was so much nicer!

     So, Dad added something new to breakfast. Once the boys' plates were on the table, Dad went to the stereo and put a particular album on the turntable.

     And he cranked the volume up.

     Soon, the tune of John Phillips Sousa's Stars And Stripes Forever was heard throughout the house, probably throughout the neighborhood.

     What a horrible way to be awakened!

     The boys were supposed to be downstairs and at their places at the table by the time the song was finished.

     And they were.

     What a way to start a Sunday.

     My brothers probably look fondly on this memory today.

     Now you are most likely wondering how my Mom felt about all this, since she was also sleeping in on Sunday morning?

     Well the Stars and Stripes Forever did not bother her at all. Most Sunday mornings Mom was awake already when Dad was fixing breakfast, or half-awake and relaxing, still in bed.      The sound of Sousa on the stereo merely meant that the boys had to get up, not her. And after the song was over, Dad would get Mom's breakfast together – there were a few more minutes for Mom to lie in bed – probably the most precious and welcome minutes of her week.

    And when Mom's breakfast was on the table, Dad walked over to the stereo once again. Each Sunday he alternated between two albums and one particular song on each album.

He would put one of the albums on and turn the volume up high.

    Through the house would then waft the tune of either Al Martino singing Mary in the Morning or Ed Ames singing My Cup Runneth Over With Love.

     By the time the song chosen for the Sunday morning was over, Mom would be descending the stairs with a robe on and a slight smile. Dad's own Mary in the Morning.

     It was all just taken for granted back then, but now, remembering and reflecting, I realize, gosh, that was pretty darn special!

185 20150704 Mary in the Morning

Shall We Dance?

   

 Once Mom got the stereo, the music collection began. Mom's very favorite singer was someone named John Gary – I don't remember him on the radio, I think Mom saw and heard him on shows like Johnny Carson. She thought he had the most perfect voice. And slowly, the John Gary album collection began – John Gary does Irish, John Gary does Spanish, Country, Christmas, show tunes. The album whose cover I most remember is the Nearness of You – popular songs of the times. I did not mind the John Gary albums so much since the songs were easy enough to sing along to (when, by request, no one else was home) but he was not quirky at all – just a good singer.

     Dad thought the most wonderful voice in all the land came from Andy Williams – and we had Andy Williams albums – country, show tunes, love songs, Christmas. We teased Dad often about Andy Williams, I guess because even though he had a great voice, there are few others who would rate him as one of the best singers of his times.

     I vaguely remember years and years after this, Mom asking her three kids if any of us wanted any of the old Andy Williams or John Gary albums – and I think Eric took a couple of the former. I said no thank you – but I will confess to playing some John Gary songs on you tube while writing this piece today – he could hit several octaves, you know.

     After a while, other artists mingled in with the favorites – I think we had three of Englebert Humperdink's albums, Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, Petula Clark, and finally, Marlene Dietrich's greatest hits. And then expanding the collection along with Christmas albums by various artists, and some classical stuff, were the show tunes.

     Mom couldn't wait to hear West Side Story when she bought it, and then she absolutely hated it – I don't think she ever listened to that album a second time. Most of the others she loved – we all did – Fiddler on the Roof, Camelot, My Fair Lady, and most especially, The King and I. When the song, Shall We Dance, came on, Mom and Dad would dance!

     Do other parents do that?

     It got so that they did not even have to have the music – they would spontaneously waltz through the house – they were Yul and Deborah – and they danced!

     The songs and then the dance – they weren't much, really, and yet they were everything – what more could a kid need?

     Now when I remember spring/all the joy that love can bring/I will be remembering/The shadow of your smile.

184 20150703 Shall We Dance?