The gift that keeps on giving

Each year, my sister and I try to get away for a weekend at the Oregon Coast. It's just sister time - no boys allowed - and we always have fun. We do have the occasional opportunity to rub each other the wrong way, but it's always fleeting and a whole lot less damaging than some of what we inflicted on each other as children!


This year, we chose to go on the weekend that encompassed the 90th anniversary of our mother's birth. In one of my more blonde moments, I commented to Peggy, "Ninety years! I'll bet she never thought she'd live to see this day!" And, of course, she didn't, having died 18 years ago. But it's a tribute to her that not only could the thought pass through my brain and out my mouth, but that my sister and I had a good chuckle over it. Mom was never one to mince words. You didn't "pass" or "pass away," you didn't go to "eternal rest," either. You died. And we knew what she wanted to be buried in ever since we were quite young. As it turned out, she was cremated and didn't get the ecru nightgown, but that was her choice. Ecru was so 1960s by then.


We played on our computers, watched Harry Potter movies, ate junk food, drank a little wine, a little Bailey's, a little Kahlua in our coffee. We had hot chocolate, popcorn, and I took along homemade clam chowder and some delicious biscuits my son had made. We watched the waves break, and the people and dogs on the shore. We went in the pool and the hot tub, and just generally had a high old time.

Then, Saturday night late, we each got a message on Facebook that our half-brother - from our dad's other family - had posted some photos and had tagged us. So, of course, we had to look!


All of a sudden, a little cloud crept into our cozy getaway. There, on Facebook, were two photos of our very own mother that we had never before seen. Our half-brother had scanned and posted them as "Old Florida pictures," and they were from our dad's photographs that Rodney has been kind enough to go through since dad died last October.

Also among the many that he posted were pictures of Peggy, our older brother, and me. Pictures that dad had kept for all these years - the most recent were taken in 1972, 38 years ago.


After my first reaction of stunned silence, and a momentary flash of anger that this should intrude on what was otherwise a perfect weekend, I shed a few tears and went out onto the balcony to let it all sink in. This man, this biological contributor, had cared enough at some point to keep these photographs of his children. The same children he abandoned and left to be raised by a crippled woman who was old before her time because of the long, hard hours she worked at physically demanding jobs. This man who had allowed our home to be foreclosed on, who had moved from Florida to Alaska and thus out of the reach of any enforced child support, this very same man had kept these photographs of his children.


Peggy thinks the keeping was not deliberate, but simply the lack of any need to weed out those things that weren't important to him. Perhaps she's right; she often is about things like this. But for a fleeting moment, it passed through my mind that maybe he had loved us after all. That maybe - despite vast amounts of evidence to the contrary - he felt proud of us and kept those pictures as a reminder of us.


Had he not avoided us on occasions when we could have seen him, and had he not shown his disregard for us in so many other ways, maybe I could eventually convince myself that he cared. Once again, I have proved to myself that being old doesn't necessarily equate to being wise!


Anyway, Happy 90th Birthday, Mom. We (mostly) enjoyed the party.

Where did I come from?

One of the blogs I read regularly is authored by my online friend (and follower of my blog) JD. Although we've never met, JD is from my home state of Florida and he writes fairly regularly about places I'm somewhat familiar with. He also writes from time to time about his genealogy research.

Now, I am a woman of many interests, and genealogy is one that has occupied me for many years. I love the connection I feel with my forebears, and when I'm lucky enough to find an old photograph, I might inspect it for a while to see if there is a family resemblance that has survived the generations. I have a membership at Ancestry.com, which isn't cheap, but it does allow me to "connect" with others who are researching common ancestors. There's a certain thrill when I find a distant ancestor's information in a census or in an old story, as well as the occasional famous person. (I recently discovered that I'm a descendant of Simon Bradstreet and Anne Dudley; quite exciting!)

One of the dangers, however, is that it's easy to be led astray by connecting with folks who aren't as diligent (read "compulsive") as I about keeping the family lines straight! That's where the family connection comes in.

I've recently been contacted by a fellow genealogist whose own family tree intersects with mine in an oblique manner: My great-aunt was married to a man named Jasper Black; my online friend's grandmother was half-sister to Jasper. So we share no blood, but do have an interest in where our family lines brush up against each other. In her research - which is more linear regarding the Blacks than is mine - she discovered that I had connected with incorrect ancestors. Now this may not seem like a big deal to those of you who live in the here and now, but what it means to me is that I now have a better chance of finding other connections for those family members who have remained elusive.

Via email, this friend and I exchanged phone numbers and she surprised me with a phone call a couple of days ago. It was pleasant to discuss Great-aunt Vesta with someone who shares an interest in the family, and since she still lives in Florida, it was nice to hear again the slight southern accent that she still carries. (My accent has all but disappeared until a few glasses of wine or an encounter with someone from the South revives it!)

By indulging in this kind of research, I know of the long family tradition of interest in things political, in our family's service at sea over the generations, and have a glimmer of where the family interest in writing has coursed its way across the centuries. I already knew that my grandfather was something of a genealogist (although he apparently had no qualms about revising the unpleasant!), and I know that it continues in my middle son as well as a few of my cousins.

My own personal religious beliefs lead me to embrace the idea of an afterlife, but regardless of what might eventually prove to be true, the Johns and Vestas and Fenns and Annes and Simons live on in my research and my desire to know who they were and where I came from. And, perhaps, so shall I in generations yet to be born!

Anticipation

It's late on the day after Christmas, and I'm suffering (quite annoyingly, I might add) with another cold. Or something. Achey body, snotty nose, fatigue, etc. Given the random thoughts that have been tumbling in my brain today, I suppose I could be hallucinating, too. Or perhaps it was just the three cups of tea with rum that I've had tonight. Excellent cold medicine, I might add!

I've had a really good Christmas this year, one that will be hard to top, since Jim's gift to me was an engagement ring! But - while I always enjoy the gifts and decorations and family time - I am also happy that we can soon settle down to the business of regularity.

There is something about the way the holidays seem to interrupt the regular flow of life - added trips to go shopping; more time spent online at Amazon and less at my favorite blogs or my genealogy site; extra pots and pans and baking sheets to unearth, use, and then put away for another year; remembering to buy more eggs, more butter, more chocolate, more everything! And then it's over.

Now, there are gifts to be put away, and - perhaps - old possessions to be discarded to make room. There are address books to update for next year's Christmas cards, and - sadly - names to be removed from the old card list. And, of course, resolutions to write actual letters to some on my card list who don't have email (and some who do!). I really am going to do that this year. Really, I am!

My mother always said, "Each year has its own tree," and so we took our Christmas tree down on New Year's Eve. Of course, this was in Tampa, so she may have been more worried about fire than tradition, but we just didn't have our tree up into the new year. My Christian tradition says that Christmas doen't end until January 6th (thus the 12 days of Christmas), but if I were going to be rigid about that, we wouldn't even put our tree up until Christmas Eve - and that's not a happening thing! So probably sometime later in the week - perhaps Saturday, the 2nd (that seems like a nice compromise, don't you think?), I will de-decorate and put things away for another year. I always promise myself that I will weed out old and broken ornaments rather than packing them away for repair next year. Maybe this year I'll even do it. Or not.

You know by now that Christmas cookie baking is low on my list of favorite things to do. Yet this year I found myself really thinking about what I was doing, and how much my kids look forward to getting cookies from Mom. I think they're less important to Ben, since he's here in town and we see each other often, but I know for Jason and Martin they provide a tasty and anticipated memory of Christmases past. And so, my cookie-making was less of a chore this year, and more a gift to my sons and their families and others with whom they share them. There are others, of course, who get cookies from me - my sister, Jim's son and some of our extended family - but only for my sons does the memory thread reach to childhood, and for them I will continue to nurture that memory, that time that means so much to them - and to me. And I will be thankful that they care, and try harder to remember the "why" instead of the "how."

Is there anything more exciting than the face of a child who anticipates the magic of Christmas? Despite the cold, the work now to be done, the after-Christmas let down most of us feel, I still anticipate, I still feel stirring within myself the magical anticipation, the belief in a Santa who brings those special, long-desired, but barely hoped-for gifts. I feel within myself that little girl who believed, and, in believing, helped to create that magic, even unto new generations.

I hope your Christmas was as magical as mine, and that the magic will carry you through these post-Christmas days.

God and applesauce

Cooking isn't something I enjoy, so I do it as seldom as I can get away with. Fortunately, Jim is understanding and we eat out a couple of times a week and each prepare our own meals most of the rest of the time; when the weather's good, we frequently barbecue and make a meal together. This singular behavior is something we both learned during our individual times of living alone, and it suits us well. Oh, he or I will cook for the other on the odd occasion, but truthfully we're both quite comfortable with our arrangment.

I do enjoy "event" cooking - holidays and other special occasions - and periodically I'll be consumed with the need to make a special meal. Jim likes my lasagna, and a freezer full of clams will occasionally call my name, turning into delicious clam chowder. I do bake Christmas cookies every year, a holdover from when my boys were small and something they still look forward to having. I don't really enjoy baking cookies, though, and anticipate that some day one of my daughters-in-law will take it over. But I'd probably miss doing it, even so.

In the fall, however, I find that I want to make applesauce! Now, applesauce doesn't really qualify as cooking; it's too easy. The prep is the difficult part for me - not hard, mind you, just stultifyingly boring. The coring, peeling, cubing - well, my mind wanders on to Deep Thoughts and before I know it (usually), the task is done and the easy part is upon me.

This morning I set upon about 10 pounds of apples with paring knife in hand. As I peeled each apple, I thought about how nice it would be to take the scraps home to put in our compost bin, and how soon - amazing, how soon! - they would mingle with tree and grass trimmings, coffee grounds, eggshells, leaves, and all the other biologic detritus of yard and kitchen, becoming a rich addition to the soil for next year's garden.

Since my mind tends to take strange and not always obvious turns at times like these, I was soon reminded of a book about space that my youngest grandson carries around and reads to anyone who will listen. It mentions in there that everything that exists today had its genesis in the instant our universe came into being. Science tells us that matter cannot be created or destroyed, only changed. And so, in some mysterious way, the apples that I peeled this morning are as old as the universe; in the process of composting their trimmings, I will be part of the process that will change them into something else!

As I continued along this seldom-traveled path in my mind, I thought about us - you, me, all the people we have ever known, all those who wish us well and those who wish us harm. We, too, were there in that instant of Creation, Big Bang - whatever you choose to call it. We are made of recycled parts, as are our children, grandchildren, people in other nations, people from other times. We don't even have to wait to die to become a part of this continuum; our bodies shed cells constantly, hair falls out, fingernails are clipped, and our own body waste returns to again be used through this mysterious (to me, anyway) process.

My final hairpin turn (the apples were in the pot and on the stove) was one of those moments that have just been waiting somewhere in my brain for decades! Why, given this natural process of which most of us are aware, and to which most of us subscribe, do some of us reject the concept of Evolution? Is it not just another example of how matter changes? If my apples in Oregon were once a pterodactyl on some other continent, then why could I not have once been an emerging single-celled sea creature? Oh, I know the analogy isn't exact, but the concept is valid.

I happen to believe in a Creator; not everyone does, of course, and others believe in a Creator to the exclusion of everything else. But I like the idea of a God who recycles and re-uses. In Psalm 139 (one of my favorite Bible passages) we read:

My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.

Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written all the days that were formed for me,
when none of them as yet existed.

How remarkable is that?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Feeling good while feeling bad

I'm sick. Nothing serious, I think, but a sore throat, a cough, a mild headache, and sneezing and dripping. It doesn't feel like the flu - swine or otherwise - but just one of those illnesses that enervates and makes you glad you don't absolutely have to do anything!

I had the foresight yesterday to bring in enough firewood to keep the woodstove going until Jim gets home in the wee hours on Monday. I have a pot of homemade clam chowder to soothe both body and soul, I've got the remote in easy reach, a comfy sofa to doze on, my computer close at hand (obviously!), and with Jim out of town, I have the luxury of thinking of no one but me.

So, of course, being who I am, I'm thinking about my family - specifically, my middle and youngest sons and their wives.

Jason and Lisa were married on my birthday in 1996. They had been friends for several years before romance blossomed, and I first met Lisa when I was moving to Oregon in 1994. One of my fondest memories of that trip can still evoke strong emotions in me: Lisa had changed the startup sound on Jason's computer to say "I love you, Jason." Every time he turned on the computer, he was greeted with that affirming statement, and it resonated with the sentimental in me - and thrilled the mom part.

Jason and Lisa are the parents of three absolutely wonderful boys: smart, loving, handsome, funny, and all of those other superlatives that grandparents apply to their grandchildren. Of course, in this case, they're all true! They're a busy, happy, involved family. They play with the boys, they tease, they participate in scouting - generally doing all the things that good parents do.

But more importantly, they love each other - and it's obvious. Every couple of years I board an airplane and fly to the midwest to visit them. For several days, I'm right in the midst of their daily lives and get to experience their relationship up close and personal. They are such a perfect match and it warms my heart to be around them. I'm also privileged to be their "Friend" on Facebook, a medium where it's not uncommon to see see the comment

Jason > Lisa: I love you

Lisa > Jason: I love you, too

Jason and Lisa: I love you both. Thanks for being friends, lovers, excellent parents, and wonderful role models on how to make marriage work and make it fun at the same time. You make it look easy.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ben and Briana celebrated their fifth anniversary this summer. I first met Briana when they were both in college, and was immediately drawn to her - not only because she's a warm, loving woman, but because she and Ben so obviously loved each other. And how can you not love someone who gives your youngest child that wonderful glow?

One memorable summer, they, along with my oldest son, shared my two-bedroom condo with me. It was a great opportunity to really get to know Briana and to observe their relationship. They are now the parents of two smart, loving, funny children: a boy and a girl. They, too, are good parents, and I love to watch them as they raise their children to take their places in this world. (Although Drew is still just a baby and her major focus is currently bubble-blowing and getting her teething ring into her mouth - she excels at both activities!)

Again, though, their biggest contribution to their children's well-being is the love they share and the time they make in their busy lives to reinforce that love. I am a more intimate part of their lives simply because I've been Granny Nanny since their oldest was only two-and-a-half months old. I'm in their home several days a week, and I see them at the most stressful times of the day - leaving for work in the morning, and coming home in the afternoon. We also have family events that we share, and I'm always thrilled to be a part of those. In times both stressful and relaxing, busy and laid back, their love and caring for each other shines through.

I'm also their Facebook "Friend," and love to see:

Ben: I'm making tea for my baby wife.

Briana: I'm curled up with my hubby watching old movies.

Ben and Briana: It has been and remains one of the great joys of my life to watch your love grow and to see the many ways you complement and care for each other. You reinforce my belief in marriage, and set an example for those who are privileged to be an intimate part of your life together.

Could I ask for more? I think my headache has even gone away!

Personal Best!

Today I have set a new personal standard for sloth. Not something to brag (or blog) about, you might think, but I've had a day that I get to enjoy only once a year, and the kind of day I used to dream about when the kids were small, and throughout my working career.

First, I slept till after 7:00. It meant I missed my local morning news, but I did get to watch Good Morning, America, which I enjoy.

Next, I read the newspaper, front to back, at my own pace, intermittently watching news, checking email, reading blogs, and drinking coffee. The only difficulty at this point was that I had to walk the 15 or so feet to refill my coffee cup periodically, and the bathroom is upstairs. If I'd had the foresight to move the coffeepot to the family room and rent a potty chair, I'd have been in hog heaven!

I then ate breakfast, watched a few t.v. shows that I had recorded, and resumed surfing the 'net and stoking the fire in the woodstove.

In the early afternoon, I actually went outside and brought in firewood so that I could keep myself warm while I loafed (it gets chilly when you aren't moving around, you know!), and watched some more television.

I had frozen fish filets and peas for dinner (yes, I did cook them), and then made clam chowder from the razor clams Jim and I dug last summer. I'm having dinner with Ben, Briana, Addison, and Drew tomorrow night, and had offered to bring food. It looks (and tastes) really good, and I'm proud of having found a good use for the clams since Jim doesn't care for them as much as I do.

I then sat here and watched 90 minutes of videos on YouTube that my oldest son had sent for me. They were all Wanda Sykes' HBO special, and I laughed so hard my sides hurt. She's a very funny lady, and if you don't mind some heavy-duty language, I recommend them highly.

I've had a couple of cups of tea, a glass of wine, and as soon as I finish this, I'm going to watch Grey Gardens, which I recorded in September. (While Jim's off hunting, I take advantage of the time to watch all of the shows I've saved that he isn't interested in!) After that, I'll be off to bed, and maybe I'll sleep in tomorrow, too.

The truly slothful part of this day is about to be revealed: I am still in my nightgown! I did put on my bathrobe to get firewood, but the only neighbors who could have seen me are out of town, so even that concession wasn't absolutely necessary. I'll put clothes on tomorrow.

Several weeks ago, at a family gathering, d-i-l, jr. and I had a brief exchange:

ME: I have the best life of anybody! (I was enjoying the family and especially being with Addison, Ada, and Drew.)
D-I-L, Jr.: No you don't. I do!

I win! (But I'm glad she feels that way!)

Night, all.

Cronies

I've never been one who sustains long-term friendships. Oh, I still have one friend from my high school years, but we were out of touch until about three years ago, so that probably doesn't count. And my sister is my friend, and we've known each other longer than either of us would like to think. And I count my daughters-in-law among my friends - and probably always will! - but, if not for my sons, I wouldn't even know them! There are a few others, female and male, who I've known for several years, but not in sustained relationships, just the kind that you call each other every year or so and catch up.

But let me tell you about Jim and Tom.

Last month, both of these "boys" celebrated their 65th birthday. Tom's wife was out of the country, but he attended Jim's bash, and on Tom's birthday, we had him over for dinner and conversation, along with a tiramisu with candles for dessert.

Tom and Jim met when they began attending Jesuit High School at the age of 14 (that was when Jim still had hair, I'm told!). Each of them has been heard exclaiming recently, "Fifty years! We've known each other for fifty years!" It's nearly as amazing to me as it is to them, even if for different reasons. I can't imagine knowing anyone I'm not related to for that long, and they (bless their hearts) can't really, deep down, imagine that they aren't still teenagers getting into some kind of mischief!

Their friendship has survived Jim's stint in the Navy back in the 60s, Tom's job move to Memphis in the 80s, marriages and divorces, raising children, travel, and most recently Tom and his wife living in Mexico for most of the year.

But every fall, without fail, finds Tom here in Portland for their annual elk-hunting expedition. After days and weeks of planning, organizing, discussing, reorganizing, packing, and double-checking their equipment and shopping lists, they're read for adventure. When Tom lived in Memphis, most of the packing up and preparation fell to Jim, but these days they work together.

This morning at about 6:45 the two of them, along with Tom's son Jeff, headed for parts east, reminding me a lot of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn! Jim's son Mike will join them tomorrow and, although I'm pretty sure it's less and less about the elk each year - at least for the two old guys - the friendship always benefits from the time they spend together at elk camp.

Happy hunting, Jim and Tom! May there be many years of it left for you to share!