This picture of our mother circa 1930 at “The Farm” in New Hampshire should bring a smile to your face.
And we could all use that, right?
“I wish I could leave you certain of the images in my mind, because they are so beautiful that I hate to think they will be extinguished when I am. Well, but again, this life has its own mortal loveliness. And memory is not strictly mortal in its nature, either. It is a strange thing, after all, to be able to return to a moment, when it can hardly be said to have any reality at all, even in its passing. A moment is such a slight thing. I mean, that its abiding is a most gracious reprieve.”
Friday again. What are your plans? This weekend I will be finishing Mr. Churchill’s Secretary written by Elizabeth Nel in 1958. She was one of Winston Churchill’s secretaries during WWII working tirelessly behind the scenes from 1941-45.
A friend at work loaned it to me and I have been enjoying it very much. It is full of intimate details only a woman would notice.
It was a new experience to travel in a battleship. It seemed like a floating city, and we were glad to see notices for our benefit: THIS WAY FORWARD, TO THE WARDROOM, etc., which must have infuriated the proper denizens. Ham and I shared a vast cabin astern; it seemed right over the propellers, and the shaking and roaring was continuous. The office was a little farther forward, but the Prime Minister’s quarters were just under the bridge and miles on toward the bow. To walk there took at least ten minutes. Four flights of steps had to be mounted, and the continual updraft was an embarrassment to one’s skirts, particularly as Royal Marines were stationed on duty at every turn.
Times have changed so much since this hard-working, patriotic young women worked so diligently for her country and for a man who liked to work in his pajamas in bed in the morning. She didn’t begrudge him this eccentricity because she knew how hard he worked. She thought nothing of it. And, of course, there was nothing to think about it.
I also have to pick out wallpaper for my dining room–an exciting prospect!
Obviously, I am leaning toward the chinoiserie…
Also, I forgot (!) to wish the boy and daughter #3 a happy 4th anniversary! A belated happy anniversary to a lovely couple!
And, hey, another lovely couple is getting hitched–daughter #2 and Nate! Date TBA, but probably a year from now.
Yippeeee! Lots of good things to look forward to in the months to come.
Tuesday I received a care package from daughter #1. It was full of the treats she had planned on bringing with her on her doomed visit over the 4th of July holiday.
How sweet is that?
Tonight I will indulge myself with a face mask while reading about Viggo Mortensen.
And, hey, doesn’t this picture featured on Chinoiserie Chic look like my bedroom?!
Well, kind of. You get the idea from this badly lit iPhone photo, right?
We had a big storm yesterday and lots of people have no electricity. Luckily we have our power, but lots of tree branches and leaves came down. Quelle mess! Of course, the storm hit just as I was driving home–yikes–I thought my little car might blow away! Ah, flyover weather…
Have a calm and peaceful Thursday! The weekend is just around the corner…
Sliced bread was first sold on this day in 1928, advertised as “the greatest forward step in the baking industry since bread was wrapped.” This huge step for mankind was taken right here in my flyover state, in Chillicothe, Missouri!
I guess they are still pretty proud of this fact.
Also on this day in 1954 Memphis DJ Dewey Phillips played “That’s All Right” for the first time on his Red, Hot, and Blue show. Listeners began phoning in, eager to find out who the singer was. It was Elvis Presley.
The rest is history.
Today is also World Chocolate Day–celebrations include the consumption of chocolate. Well, duh.
So what is our message for today? Enjoy the day! Take a risk! Eat dessert!
Speaking of going for the gusto, here is a picture of the boy playing ice hockey in his men’s league.He wanted to play as a youngster, but we encouraged him to speed skate instead, which he did for several years. Then he switched to lacrosse. Good to see him finally padded up and happy! (BTW, where’s your mouth guard?!)
The other evening I attended the memorial service of a dear friend who died a few weeks ago, aged eighty. Barb was the exact opposite of me–extremely extroverted and effervescent, always on the go, always pitching in. She was like Auntie Mame–you know, “Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death!” She was not starving.
Barb was the person who got me to venture across the street to Ivy-Selkirk’s Auction House and started me on the road to estate sale-ing. She never understood timidity. She was a Just Do It person. We disagreed about many things, but unlike a lot of people these days, we respected each other’s opinions. We agreed, after all, on the important things.
After years of Catholic school and child-rearing and being told what she could and couldn’t do, Barb finally threw up her hands and turned her back on the RC Church. She became an Episcopalian at age 55 and she never looked back. She became a pillar of her new church and it was packed for her funeral.
The church she attended in the city is a self-styled “progressive” one and so there were liberties taken with the service–four speakers in the middle–but it was still very nice and even (surprisingly) Rite I. The readers, all adult grandchildren, were pretty terrible, but the scriptures were well chosen. The speakers–two friends and two children–were wonderful. They made everyone laugh, remembering Barb. The minister, young and wet behind the ears, was straight out of central casting–the guy to call when you need a nerdly, balding, beanpole cleric. I would not hold his looks against him, but his voice was high and thin and he raced through communion. He made me appreciate our rector and long for Arthur Shields.
It was a long service, but it was a celebration of Barb’s life, so why shouldn’t it be? Her friends and family will truly miss her. And we will remember her.
“Remember the wonderful works that he has done,” goes David’s song–remember what he has done in the lives of each of us; and beyond that remember what he has done in the life of the world; remember above all what he has done in Christ-remember those moments in our own lives when with only the dullest understanding but with the sharpest longing we have glimpsed that Christ’s kind of life is the only life that matters and that all other kinds of life are riddled with death; remember those moments in our lives when Christ came to us in countless disguises through people who one way or another strengthened us, comforted us, healed us, judged us, by the power of Christ alive within them. All that is the past. All that is what there is to remember. And because that is the past, because we remember, we have this high and holy hope: that what he has done, he will continue to do, that what he has begun in us and our world, he will in unimaginable ways bring to fullness and fruition.
Into paradise may the angels lead thee, Barb, and at thy coming may the martyrs receive thee, and bring thee into the holy city Jerusalem.
So the OM asked me on Saturday if I wanted a fancy coffee cake or what on Mother’s Day and I said what I really would like is a donut. So he said he would go to Dunkin’ Donuts on Sunday morning. What kind of donut did I want? I said I would like a plain cake donut or a cake donut with chocolate frosting.
So on Sunday morning he duly left the house at 7 a.m. to go to Dunkin’ Donuts. He came back with half a dozen donuts: 2 blueberry, 2 glazed and 2 chocolate cake donuts with frosting.
What? When I questioned him about his selection, he said, “Well, that’s what they had.”
Sigh.
Anyway, I went to church where we were celebrating our confirmation class kids who were confirmed two weeks ago down at the Cathedral. It was a nice service and afterwards there was a reception and cake. I gave my mentee one of my favorite Frederick Buechner books and to my surprise, she gave me a present:
A birdhouse that looks like a church! I was very touched. I’m sure Brigid and I will be lifelong friends.
The boy and daughter #3 came over for dinner. We bar-b-qued turkey burgers and drank leftover beer from my birthday party.
Today we wish Elizabeth a happy 90th birthday. She was born four months after our mother and to me, at least, they always bore an uncanny resemblance to one another.
How was your weekend? Mine was pretty busy–at least for me. I went to a few estate sales, but didn’t find anything of note. I went to a funeral and I went to a fundraiser that daughter #3 had organized with the student government of the high school where she teaches. It was a benefit for the Greater St. Louis Honor Flight which sends WWII veterans to Washington to see the WWII memorial there. The boy was a “guardian” on one of these trips a few years ago. Anyway, we enjoyed the event and the movie about how the charity was started.
Afterwards we went out for pizza and beer.
When I got home I tried to watch Straw Dog (1949), the great Akira Kurosawa film about post-war Japan. A very young and handsome Toshiro Mifune plays a rookie detective who has lost his gun and is madly trying to find it. It is a great, great movie, but I fell asleep.
Mea culpa. It had been a long day.
I re-read Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons. It was her first book and very good indeed.
On Sunday I did a lot of cleaning in my house, throwing away copious amounts of detritus. This always makes me happy.
Now it is Monday. Daughter #1 starts her new job. She no longer works for The Man, but for a start-up digital network, working with creative types who have man-buns. You go, girl!
P.S. Don’t forget in all the hubbub of your daily life to take a moment and enjoy the scenery.
Did you have a nice weekend? The weather here in flyover country was blustery and cool, but the sun shone and it was good to be out and about.
On Saturday the OM and I drove to Washington, MO on the Missouri River to have a yummy lunch at the Blue Duck which is just down the street from this landmark:
We went to a few antique stores/mall on the way home. I found something for daughter #2’s birthday which is around the corner. All in all, a nice day-trip to another part of our scenic state.
On Sunday I had to go to church early for another confirmation mentor class with my 8th grade mentee.
Here are some of them down at the Cathedral for an overnight “Lock-in”–remember those?
Besides other stuff, it was the Sunday when they declared their intentions to be confirmed. Thankfully, mine filled out her little card. I would have felt like such a failure if she had decided not to conform and/or be confirmed! (The year-long course is called “confirm, not conform”–catchy, right?) Well, way to go, Brigid!
The boy and daughter #3 came over to dinner and he told us all about his new job, which he started last week. Daughter #1 is also starting a new job in a week, so we are all in a tizzy of anticipation over new beginnings.
In the middle of all this, the OM and I watched The Martian (2015) with Matt Damon, which was okay, but I have to admit I lost interest halfway through. It all seemed mighty far-fetched, not to mention overly long.
We also started watching a British TV show called The Detectorists, which I just love.
It stars Mackenzie Crook (who also wrote and directed it) and Toby Jones and a cast of wonderful English actors. IMDB describes it as a show about “the lives of two eccentric metal detectorists, who spend their days plodding along ploughed tracks and open fields, hoping to disturb the tedium by unearthing the fortune of a lifetime.” But this is erroneous. They are not looking for treasure. They are interested in making an important historical find. The difference is important. And they do not hate their lives. They have a hobby about which they are passionate. And as for plodding along ploughed tracks, the scenery is beautiful!
Anyway, I highly recommend you watch it (on Netflix). It is very funny and also sweet. And I think the message is that the real treasure in our lives are our family and friends.
And I like the theme song:
Sadly, there are only six episodes and season two is not on Netflix! Ugh.
dual personalities 