Monday, July 15, 2013

Look at Stoney-Boy's Face!

He is looking like Paul, these days. What an adorable little rascal he looks to be? Why is Addy-Grace in the middle of the picture, or he didn't like whatever they fed him in that picture? He is not the center of attention anymore. It is Camille's turn and she obviously has the new special guest star who's the next coming attraction. What a beautiful billboard her nice belly is for the coming one! I am so excited to see the beauty. Addy and Stoney are stepping aside for the new crew. I remember when Jo was in the tummy and Mom looked like Camille{just, a little shorter} and Mu said, is this the last one, Camille? We, just kept coming and do keep coming. Is this the last one, Camille? Mu is still asking. I don't think so. What an adorable New York crew there was at that party. Was it Ton-Ton's birthday party? We were there in spirit and I can't wait to see that Addy, in person who takes me back to my 18 month old self, by looking like my first baby sister.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

The little clip of Baby Addison reminds me of my first baby sister. It can take me back to my 18 month old self and today, I am remembering our cuckoo clock...

That baby couldn't look more like her grandmother and I do wish I could pinch her sweet fat cheeks. I was telling the story of the .dynamic duo, before baby Jackie came from the stork to our house. First thing was the cuckoo clock and me. I remember the chain of the cuckoo clock and the little bird that used to come out on the hours at our house. We had shiney wood floors at 113 and me and my mommy and my daddy lived there before Ju.

I was so happy to have a baby sister, when she came home, I wanted to pick her up. I do remember pulling the chains on the cuckoo clock and I guess that I am the one who broke it, even though I didn't know that it was broken. It just stopped cuckooing, one day.

When baby Ju came, we became great friends. I remember playtimes, under the table and how huge dad's chair seemed to us. We sat, one on one side of the chair and one on the other side of the chair and swang the arm of the chair to each other. We played catch like that, many times. Until...it hit both of us in the teeth and we had a brown front tooth, the both of us, from that play session.

We stood on our heads at the landing of the steps and rolled down those steps many, many times. We really did think that we were grown children and they would shut the lights off downstairs to keep us from going downstairs when unsupervised. When mom was expecting baby Jackie, we decided to get some orange juice from the fridge, by ourselves. We didn't want to bother mommy for such a thing.

I remember opening the fridge and grabbing the juice bottle and hearing mommy's voice, screaming, I dropped the glass all over the kitchen floor. Poor mommy, fell down the steps and slid into the kitchen, like a baseball player. We were quite a pair. Talk about little rascals.

I am sure that nobody had more of a wrestling with curiosity of children than our mom. If the chains of the cuckoo clock would have held us we would have played a type of jump and pull, with the chains. Jumping and bumping our heads on the clock and then the other going up when we fell to the floor on our bottom. We laid on the bottom steps with our feet on the wall and calculated, what mischief we would get into next. When we were outside, we slid down the brick steps as though the slide was high and tall. It is amazing to imagine how little we were.

I remember the tears in Uncle Paulies' eyes when we went to Georgia, for what seemed like such a long, long time. We felt like we would never see him again. Maybe it was a few days, maybe it was a week when we were gone. To us and our grown uncle Paulie, it seemed an eternity.

I do wish that somebody would send me a picture of Elijah's baby, because she is probably the picture of baby Jackie and it is like a puzzle in my mind that comes together when I see these replica's of my baby sister dollies. I loved them to pieces and still do.

Saturday, July 6, 2013

Ruth's Quips, "Here's Your Hat"...etc

Since Gramma Ruth passed, nearly 13 years now, I have thought of compiling her terse sayings together into a book for my children. Oh, how I remember, though not often with fondness the sayings rolling off of her lips, over and over and over again. For Ezra, who is my only child who never met, "Ruthy" {as Dad would call her} I did a before school series of discussions on the sayings of Ruth. We talked about the way she pulled her sword out of sheeth and she had specific intentions for each word. ie "Youth is wasted on the young"

She got these sayings from her travels and she didn't intend a one of her offspring to die without their inheritance. These sayings were the inheritance and what they meant were for the lot of us to dig out in our own experience.

I must say that at the time I was not disposed to respect her reusing other people's sayings the way that she did. I was more inclined to respect the contemporary muses of my day and poo-pooed the likes of "a stitch in time saves time" crowd. I know now that she and I were kindred spirits, weaving words into the minds of our youth, hopefully, for their profit. I was privy to her early efforts, before she calmly learned how to skillfully enter the admiration of youngsters. She used to just slam us with sayings.

Toward the end of her life, we had made peace with eachother, which was confirmed by her saying to me, "remember when you wouldn't come into my house?" I do remember Gram. I do remember. Now, I see her everyday. When I look into the mirror, when I see the terse way that I handle my younguns. I am thankful that she taught me to love her, over time.

She wove word usage into my psyche the hardest way possible and taught me to wrestle the word usage into my unwordy children as well as my wordy children. For that, I am truly grateful. I came to her house one day and she was playing the memory game with Muffy. What is up, Ruth? I thought to myself, where is your sword? This is my sword and yesterday, I learned the memory game with her, for the profit of my own children who say the same to me, when I am a softy. Where is your sword? {tongue} I do want to hold your hand, Ruth and weave words into the minds of my kids...

Friday, July 5, 2013

Today, I'm the 'fool on the hill", admiring the nationalism of rooting for Andy Murray.

What a pretty picture of nationalism is Andy Murray! The whole country is rallying for him to win Wimbledon. Not, you can do it, but we can do it! It is for all of us that you win. What a unifying factor is winning. We all want to do it and we all want to enter into the thrill of victory for our nation. I look at this in the shadow of our Independence Day. We celebrate together our victory over "dependence". We are no longer "dependent" we are "independent". But, will we ever get to the point of our forbearers in interdependence, as expressed in the UK through Andy Murray? It's a victory for our country, if our fellow wins our national tourney? Maybe. We had days of Jimmy Connors and John MacEnroe and Arthur Ashe and now the winners of the Williams, etc. But does it form a cohesive bond? It doesn't seem to. There is room to grow in our independence or interdependence as we strive toward God's intention for the image of God, as it shows itself in our nationalism. Not pride but unified striving. Moral support that is more than that. Something that gives us a reason to win. I do hope Andy wins it for them.

Title- The Studious One!

Title-  The Studious One!
artwork by Elyse

Of biscuits and syrup

Of biscuits and syrup
tasty treats

Happy Saturday!

Happy Saturday!
a day at the Raptor Center.

Widdle Emmie in outer space school

Emmie jumped on the bus and off it flew out into the atmosphere. There was a set of clouds with turbulence right above the house and it took a few minutes for my Emmie to buckle her seatbelt. They hit the bump hard and it knocked my Emmie out of her seat and she bumped her head. The video camera came on and the monitor looked through and stated, Ms. Emmie, where are you? You are not in your seat. Where are you? I am alright I fell because I hadn’t buckled correctly. Well jump up Emmie we have a long way to go and you have to be buckled there is entirely too much turbulence in the stratosphere for you to unbuckle now. As soon as we are through this weather system there will be straight sailing but right now you must buckle. Emmie scrambled into the seat with intensity and purpose now. She watched every cloud pass her window and her nose was pressed to the window trying to see the top of the house as it drifted slowly out of sight. Soon they were not only out of sight of the house, the sun came out brightly and just as quickly they were putting on the atmospherical breathing apparatus and the outerspherical lights. The ABA and the OL. These precautions were to make them appear to be satellites to the radar as they were out in the ionosphere. Emmie knew all about this now. She had gone to the orientation and had a good breakfast and it took them 20 minutes for her to get out past the atmospherical pull and to feel the zero gravity. It would be 15 minutes before the gravity simulators would take effect, a glitch in the system which was being worked on. Until then, they enjoyed the couple of minutes of floatation, while being connected to the seats by belt. The first thing they saw everyday was the strataflotsam. The items which had been dumped into the atmosphere by earlier generations. What would their generation do about this ecological waste area that remained floating above their heads? This was a question for the generations. For now it was the area that they had to guide through on the way to school.

Midnight at the OASIS

Midnight at the OASIS
Sunset in Huntersville

My little Emmie

ran to the bus on the first day of the last year of school. 2 buns on the side of her head. She kissed me and ran at dawn to the bus. She was starting the adventure of a lifetime. I would never see that little girl again, she was going to woman school!

My Father and I 1989

My Father and I 1989

to the tune of Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme

A VISIT TO PAPA











Are you going to Mary Immaculate?

Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



Remember me to the one who lived there,



He once was a true love of mine,



Tell him to buy me an acre of land,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



Between the muddy Hudson in Jamaica Bay,



Then, He’ll be a true love of mine,

Tell him to sow in it seeds of pure cream,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



And build Ice cream mountains and buildings of whipped cream,

Then, He’ll be a true love of mine,



Tell him to reap them with sickles of M&M’s,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



And chew bubble gum and eat till we’re done,



Then, He’ll be a true love of mine.



Tell him to run it off down the motor parkway,



Apricots, Chocolate Cherries and Pie,



After your done 50 pushups



and jog down the West Side Highway,



Then he’ll be a true love of mine…

(Don’t wait for me today dad, The kids are sick again, My tummy’s bulging again, My heart is aching again, And now there’s no love there…)





He once was, a true love of mine….So, Girls, I do beg you don't miss your Daddy,Apricots, Chocolate cherries and Pie,You have one short chance to see him on this side, Go visit him and let your light shine.