Farewell to 2016

And in several respects—good riddance. But I will not let the year end without mentioning two wonderful events. I already wrote about the birth in April of our twenty second grandchild. Gladys Grace has come to be known as Gigi and when I get my new camera working, there will be many a photo of her and her lovely head of black hair.

In August the entire family got together at Hueston Woods in Ohio to celebrate our fiftieth wedding anniversary. Every child, spouse and grandchild was there. It is possible that although “chunks” of us will be together in the future, there will be the odd one or two missing. Two grandchildren started college this year, in two years there will be three in college and the following year six. Each family had a cabin: there were plenty of activities to keep everyone busy during the day and the children took it in turns to cook dinner at night. On the final Saturday we went to mass in the town of Oxford, Ohio and shared the celebration with a couple who were marking their sixtieth anniversary. There is a photo of us all together, but it is still resting on Lucy’s phone and she can’t download it. Maybe one day, but until then—

Here is oldest child Al with his wife Gody. From left to right, Gody, Al, Ernie, Frederick, me, Manny, Nate and Alex.

Then comes Kate and husband Ron. The same two oldies (but goodies) are in all the photos, but here we have Kate, Ron, Charlie, Eleanor, Patrick and Daniel.

Next in line come daughter Liz and her husband Jeff. There’s Caroline, Lydia, Jeff, Henry (in front), Ben, Liz and Evelyn.

Here’s our younger son is Andrew, who with his wife Marcie is the parent of six of our grandchildren. l-r Veronica, Theodore, Josephine, Andrew, Sebastian, Marcie, Linus and Liesl.

Last, but not least, are Lucy and Peter. Peter is holding Joe, Lucy is holding Gigi and Peter’s daughter Blake is in front.

It was a joyful and fitting way to mark our anniversary. This December Gody’s Italian mother is spending the Christmas season with the family in Virginia. Andrew and his family joined them for Christmas dinner and Patrizia described the event on Facebook as “allegra confusione.” Sounds about right.

So here’s to more allegra confusione in 2017.

Remember These?

I have made headway in my big photo sorting project. I kept lowering the bar, from fantasies of creating albums for all my children or scanning everything to my eventual solution of making reasonably equitable piles, sticking them in brown envelopes and handing them out the the kids when we got together in August (I’ll get round to that before the end of the year.) Finally I found a box of slides. I didn’t want to get rid of them, but since I had not looked at them for fifty years, it seemed silly to mourn their demise.  Some were marked, but I wanted to know what parts of my past were captured in them. I tried putting them up to the light and squinting, but that was to no avail. I know we have a screen in the basement because we show outdoor movies to the grandchildren in the summer and I am pretty sure we have one of those carousel things somewhere. Memories of slide shows with back to front and upside down photos! But I wouldn’t know what to do with them when I identified them all.

I have no idea where I got the camera I used or what happened to it. I do have some photos which I had professionally printed at that period. They are so clear and bring back great memories and I suppose they too were taken on that camera. I obviously had the camera during my three years at the University of London. There are slides marked “Primrose Hill” and "Regent’s Park” as well as some arty views from my residence hall window in Swiss Cottage. The shot of the mail box wreathed in mist is  rather effective, but several titles containing words like “view from so and so in the fog” should probably have been changed to “underexposed.”

The camera went with me to Greece and there are countless views of crumbling temples, most of which I had the sense to label with the name of the site. I remember taking photos at the Corinth Canal, in Crete, at Knossos and Mycene, in Athens and Sparta, in Delphi and Epidaurus. The slides were a great memento, but now they too are part of the past.

The camera also crossed the Atlantic and I have slides of some of the wonderful friends I made in Los Angeles. I could just about make out a slide showing Ernie with a horse, and it made sense when I found others labeled “Will Rogers State Park” and “Polo at Will Rogers.” A number of slides of my oldest children as babies indicate the camera made its way to Michigan, but cheaper, easier and quicker methods of photography must have taken over. So I bid these mementos farewell, BUT . . .

. . . Santa Claus read my blog and guess what I found under the Christmas tree? I love the color.

More technology to wrestle with, but I am excited. Seven years ago I started another blog, with the aim of posting a photo every day. I had to abandon it because of computer problems. I was almost glad, because coming up with a photo every day was so hard, but it might be good for me now and get me out of the house.

Maybe 52at77?

Christmas Day, 2016

Each Christmas that comes now is different. Not better, not worse, just different. I was reading a blog the other day where the writer remarked that she and her husband  “always have a glass of sherry and a mince pie on Christmas Day afternoon.” The idea of “always” seems a little foreign to me now.

No Midnight Mass for us—we would both fall asleep before it even started—but an early Mass this morning, followed by a nice breakfast for two, not the big ham breakfast for the whole family that has been our custom. It was rather pleasant and certainly restful to drink coffee and read the newspaper before putting together the dish I was taking to Christmas dinner. And what a dinner! Peter and Lucy hosted us in their new house which has plenty of room for the Detroit part of the family, and it was wonderful to be in the company of out two youngest grandchildren, who had nine cousins and their big sister to keep them occupied. Technology brought us two FaceTime encounters with the DC part of the family and with my brother and his family celebrating in Barton Mills. Lots of loud noise and handwaving as everyone tried to make contact.

Another readily apparent change this Christmas is seen in this photo of the basket where we always put the Christmas cards we receive. Although we can explain the lack of cards by saying that so many of our friends are infirm or in way too many cases now dead, I know from talking to younger friends that the exchange of Christmas cards is becoming a dying custom. I am saddened by that fact, but I regret to say that this was not a Christmas for us to send cards or the customary letter—and last year was not either. I have thought lovingly of old friends and I fully intend to make up for my failure with some letters in the new year, but we all know where good intentions lead. I fear the age of Christmas cards is destined to become the era of Christmas tweets.

Autre temps, autres moeurs.

For to everyone who has . . .

 . . . will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Anyone reading this blog and noting that two of the last three entries have titles taken from the New Testament will be forgiven for wondering if he has come across an index to a book of homilies (or a political rant, of which there have been many in the press lately.)

This quotation came to me as I was writing in the last post about Cyber Monday and availing myself of discount coupons. I feel guilty. The catalogs that come from stores from whom I have already ordered offer me 40% off and free shipping. Krogers, where I spend an awful lot of money on food, regularly sends me a nice wallet of coupons with hefty discounts on some products I buy regularly (yes, Big Brother is watching) and a straight $5 or $10 on meat and on vegetables and $20 or so off my total bill.

I understand the business think. I am a regular shopper, known as a valued customer, and they are luring me back into their store for my well earned reward—and to spend more. But I wish they would provide a box where I could deposit my coupon for the use of someone who couldn’t afford to spend enough in the first place to warrant his own rebate. These would add up nicely for those who could use a little help with their grocery bills.

For to every one who has will more be given. I know this does not refer to material goods but to understanding. I still feel guilty.

The End of a Holiday.

Thanksgiving is over. I have performed my usual rituals—I sat patiently by the phone last night waiting to hear from the travelers on their way to Virginia (they finally got there just before 10:00 p.m. after twelve hours of bumper to bumper traffic), I have photographed the unclaimed objects (so far a scarf, a fork, a hat and a fuzzy throw) and will e-mail to the photos to any of the 23 people to whom they might belong. That’s only four families, so not so difficult.  I have begun the task of washing armfuls of flannel sheets and towels and I have placed the phone call to the appliance repair man to solve my problems with the obligatory appliance which breaks down on a major holiday. The time it was the dishwasher—and they can’t send anyone out until Friday.

Thanksgiving is the time for—well, giving thanks and I am so grateful to my wonderful children who have accepted the fact that my days as the official mater familias are over.  I think it was the time I dropped the turkey that did it. They take it in turns to host the major holidays and Kate and Ron even stepped in with a pierogi dinner two days after they hosted Thanksgiving. Everyone was at our house the day after Thanksgiving and we all pitched in. It wasn’t until dinner was over and I had lamented several times that I didn’t have anything green on the table that I remembered the spinach, brussel sprouts and cauliflower and broccoli in the basement refrigerator. Ah well. Corn too.

My photos show the dinner tables at Kate’s house. There was an adult table, a big kids’ table and a (slightly) smaller kids’ table. The age differences are no longer reflected by the grocery bills. Everyone (except baby Gigi and two year old Joe) packs it away these days. And what a treat it was to talk with my two college freshmen grandsons. They talked patiently to me about technology, but I am not sure much of it stuck. As the years go by it will be harder and harder to get everyone together. We missed Andrew and his family and Gody who was on call, but it was a wonderful holiday. Ron escorted a large group down to a University of Detroit/ Mercy basketball game and there were various other expeditions.

Yes, a photo would be wonderful, but I gave up on my camera a while ago and either my iPhone  camera is having a bad time or my hands are shaking. The next major holiday is upon us, so Santa Claus, if you are reading this, I have been a nice girl and my camera wants (and needs) are modest.

Whatsoever a Man Soweth, That Shall He Also Reap.

My daughter and I were talking about Thanksgiving, and I asked her when her son, who is coming to the end of his first semester of college, will be coming home to celebrate with the family. She gave me his schedule and then said, “Patrick thinks he’ll be able to get to the airport OK”, or something to that effect. I must admit, part of me thought “I hope he can figure it out” (he’s still a little boy to me) and then it occurred to me that I had never worried about my kids finding their way to an airport when they were coming home. They just did it and to my mind, that was one of the things college was about. Learning to take care of themselves, figuring out what had to be done and using innate intelligence to get themselves on a plane. College always seemed like the beginning of adulthood, rather than the end of childhood.

For the last week following the results of the election we have been reading about college professors cancelling exams because their students are in mourning, or bringing tissues to class, not giving the scheduled lectures and allowing their class to express their feelings and use the classroom as a safe space to vent their grief, anger and frustration. I will make a lot of enemies, but I find this ridiculous. Perhaps a lecture on the history and meaning of the Electoral College or some other topic rooted in history or precedence would be in order. On the other hand, most of their parents did not expect their tuition money to be spent on Kleenex or comfort food. Now I am seeing students are taking to the streets, disrupting traffic and generally marching to protest  the election. One of my great nieces is marching in New York, one of my great nieces is complaining of the traffic jams in DC.

I have seen suggestions that the pandering to the young is the result of a generation of children who were never rewarded for skill or competence, but just for turning up. The ultimate in entitlement.

I don’t know, but I do think it important for young adults to find on their own the literal or metaphorical airport that will take them where they want to go.

November 8, 2016

Election Day. And no, I am not going to write anything about the candidates, the political parties, the campaigns and some of the general nastiness that has been going on. And it has been nasty. Mudslinging left and right. I am sure I will sit up late this evening to watch the results coming in. I am a little tired of pollsters and political pundits.

I wrote a post earlier this year in which I questioned Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, NOT because of the politics involved, but because I was having age-related issues and wondered if she could put up with the  effort involved in campaigning and answering the phone at 3:00 a.m. The same goes for Donald Trump, but it was easier to put myself in HRC’s shoes.

The fact is, I am marking today not because it is election day, but because it is the first day since my surgery that I have not slept away the afternoon. In fact I spent it struggling with some computer issues and solving some of them relatively well. I am hoping that I will be able to sleep tonight and maybe soon start to tackle some of the chores which have been piling up. I still look extremely attractive with a black eye and badly bruised forehead caused by going back on a little too much medication for a while. I am not going to re-post the nasty photograph that appeared on Facebook. It is a delicate balance.

So let’s hope that in many ways things will be better. For me and the entire country.