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It’s All Fun!

Aug5
Our tour of Quebec was on a sunny day. Tammie sat on the top deck. The view from there was excellent, but unfortunately she was painfully sunburned!

Tammie pulled out her phone to take notes, and I had a tablet when we sat down across from each other in the living room. My daughter stated, “Let’s get this all figured out tonight, because shore excursions filled up really fast before our last cruise.” I did remember. There had been some excursions that were fully booked by the time we looked at what we wanted to do!

I also remembered that we had managed to schedule shore excursions at each port of call. The things we saw and did were fun, but when our ship pulled out of dock, I wished that Tammie and I would have had time to visit the town built around the port. Also, the cost of all those shore excursions had doubled the cost of my cruise.

That night, Tammie and I agreed that the only excursion we really wanted to go on was the one that would show us where the story about Anne of Green Gables took place.

Three months before taking this cruise, I had had my right hip replaced. Walking suddenly felt good again. While aboard ship, I surprised myself by walking a few laps around the promenade deck with my daughter, Niki. Although walking was painless, I was out of shape. Our first port of call on Sunday morning was Portland, Maine. Tammie said, “The church where we will attend Mass is just a few blocks from the dock.” What I failed to remember or maybe didn’t realize was that the distance was all uphill! I wasn’t used to that type of energetic walking.

We stopped often and rested along the way. When we arrived at the church, we were told, “Because today is Corpus Christi, Mass will take place at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.” He pointed uphill and said, “It’s just a block or two up that street.”

In Halifax, we bought tickets for a Hop-On, Hop-Off bus. This line of ancient, double-decker buses had a set route through the city, stopping at several places of interest. By the time we finished going through the Halifax maritime museum, we only waited five minutes for another bus to roll up.

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Anne of Green Gables

Jul29

Blindingly bright afternoon sunshine streamed through the large western window into my living room. I pulled the drapes shut. The afternoon was warm, and my old brick farmhouse could retain coolness for most of the day if Istopped the sunshine from coming in and toasting the living room carpet. The sweet aroma of baked chocolate chip bars filled the air.

While transferring laundry from the washer to the dryer, I heard the back door of the house slam. My daughters were home. My husband, Arnie, would soon be home, too. I congratulated myself on good timing. The dessert bars were cooling on the counter, and the family supper would be ready in about an hour.

I walked into the living room with a basket of laundry that needed to be folded and found my twelve-year-old and sixteen-year-old daughters lying on the living room floor watching ‘Anne of Green Gables’ on television. Sitting down on the sofa, I pulled the laundry basket closer to me. Tammie popped up at my knee and asked, “When will we be having supper? We want a chocolate chip bar!”

Shaking the wrinkles out of a pair of jeans, I admitted, “I couldn’t resist eating a small wedge of it when it was fresh from the oven. We won’t eat for another hour. Cut a small serving for yourselves. I doubt it’ll ruin your appetites.”  Pausing the VHS tape, Niki and Tammie jumped to their feet and ran into the kitchen.

Buying the ‘Anne of Green Gables’ VHS set with Meghan Follows as Anne, had been a wise decision. My daughters watched the series repeatedly. I loved watching it with them. Both daughters swooned over good-looking Gilbert Blythe. They became frustrated with how Anne Shirley treated him. We all laughed when red-haired Anne smashed her school slate over Gilbert’s head when he called her ‘Carrots’. Anne did many foolish things like confusing a jar of raspberry juice with raspberry cordial. As a result, her greedy ‘bosom friend’, Diana Barry, got very drunk. We cried over sweet, gentle, Matthew’s death and Marilla regretting her decision as a young woman that ended her relationship with John Blythe.

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Mid-West Gourmet

Jul22
Escargot, a.k.a. snails

The hostess led me, my daughters, and granddaughter though the busy dining room to an empty table. Outside the many dining room windows that lined the huge room, we could see choppy, blue-gray water rushing past our ship, the MS Zuiderdam. We had left port hours ago, and were now traveling through the open, northern Atlantic Ocean.

Once seated, and with cloth napkins spread open on our laps, our waiter handed us menus. The starters listed that evening were jumbo shrimp cocktail, tomato and red bell pepper bisque, escargot Bourguignon and lentil Tabbouleh salad with feta. I ordered, “The escargot, please.”

I knew what I was ordering. My appetizer that evening would be snails floating in garlic butter, accompanied by a four-inch-long bun that looked like a small loaf of French bread. Many people refuse to eat escargot because they think they would be slimy and disgusting. I discovered that the little snails are delicious, and not slimy at all! I ordered escargot twice on my most recent cruise.

Having grown up on a dairy farm, I know where milk, cheese, butter and ice cream comes from and how it is made, but when I got home from my trip, I started to wonder if there was such a thing as a snail farm. I knew I had to do some research after a person asked me, “Was the escargot slimy? Because, after all, a snail is just a garden slug that wears a shell.”

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Vacation food

Jul8

Our daughters had wandered away to play in the living room when they finished eating. My husband and I continued to sit at the table discussing our plans for the rest of the day. Arnie told me where he was going and what time he’d get back home. My response was, “What would you like for supper tonight, hamburgers in mushroom gravy or chicken?”

Arnie turned to look at me with a startled expression on his face. He exclaimed, “My gosh, woman! Don’t you ever stop thinking about food? We just finished eating a meal and now you’re already thinking about eating again!”

I responded indignantly, “Do you somehow think that the meals I make are whipped up in half and hour with no planning? The meat is frozen. It needs to be thawed out. Then it must be prepped and roasted or fried long enough for it to get done!”

To be fair, the only ‘meals’ that my husband ever made were fried eggs, fried freshly caught fish or cheese and sausage sandwiches that he hastily slapped together during a commercial. The ingredients Arnie needed to make these meals were always magically found in the kitchen when he wanted them. He didn’t seem to recognize that it took planning ahead on my part when buying groceries.

Shortly after our daughter, Niki, was married, she commented one day to me about how hard it was to constantly make meals. I knew what she meant. Making one meal is easy, but looking ahead to making a lifetime of meals is intimidating.

Through the years, Niki became a pro at planning and making meals for a large family. Every summer, she takes a vacation with her children. Since eating every meal at restaurants would be very expensive, my daughter makes meals ahead, freezes them, and packs them in ice-filled coolers. Motel room kitchenettes are small and inconvenient, but she manages to provide her children with good, home-made vacation food.

My other daughter, Tammie, and I took a cruise last year. When we got home, we talked non-stop about the wonderful meals that we were served aboard the ship. This year when the opportunity for us to take another cruise came up, I invited Niki to join us. She accepted the invitation and commented she couldn’t remember when she last took a vacation that didn’t require her to make meals ahead that had to be frozen and packed in an icebox.

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Hung-Up on Hangers

Jun3

Stepping back, I scanned the closet with satisfaction. I’d drastically reduced the contents which had been hidden for so many years behind its two 1970-style folding doors. There were two piles of closet contents on the bedroom floor behind me. One pile would be gathered up and placed in the garbage. The other pile would go to Saint Vincent de Paul as a donation. All that I had left in the closet was sorted and neatly stored in boxes.

When they were little, my two daughters shared the bedroom with this closet. I smiled, remembering one summer in their childhood. I would tuck them into bed each night and they never failed to request that I shut the closet doors. When I asked them why having the closet doors ajar bothered them, they explained that a giant frog holding a huge trident was in that closet at night. They didn’t sound scared but were insistent that the doors be closed.

Before shutting the doors on the newly cleaned closet, I gave it one last satisfied glance. Something I hadn’t noticed before suddenly came into focus: high in the closet, all shoved to one end, hanging on a mounted water pipe was a huge collection of wire clothes hangers. I’d stopped hanging clothing in this closet years ago but kept the wire hangers.

There were two different types of hangers. One third of them had spring-loaded clips on each end, which was ideal for hanging skirts or pants. They were good, sturdy old-fashioned hangers made to last. The rest of the clothes hangers were all made of heavy gauge wire. No matter how heavy a coat is, the weight wouldn’t make the wire bend.  I couldn’t bear to throw any of them out. You can’t buy new ones of this quality anymore!

Later that day, I started to think about my obsessive determination to keep the old-fashioned clothes hangers. On a recent visit to a store, I’d seen sturdy plastic clothes hangers in various colors. It made me wonder if people color-code their wardrobes or match the hanger colors to their bedroom walls. Clothes hangers certainly aren’t hard to replace.

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Another Dam Ship

May13

I frowned and requested, “Say that again. What is our cruise ship’s name?”

My daughter Tammie, who plans, organizes, schedules and purchases tickets for all our vacations, repeated and explained, “It’s called the Eurodam. The ship belongs to the Holland America Cruise Line.”

We had never taken a cruise for a vacation before, so I didn’t know what to expect. I doubted the experience would be like the 1980’s television show “Love Boat,” and I hoped it wouldn’t be like some of the cruise stories I’d had people tell me about: the ship being one huge, non-stop floating buffet.

Tammie and I started to explore the possibility of taking a cruise vacation because I like traveling and visiting different places, but dislike packing and unpacking as we move from one hotel to the next. I wanted a vacation where I could visit several cities while staying in one place. Our cruise to Alaska and back through the inside passage checked all the boxes on my ‘want list.’

Our cabin in the Eurodam matched a typical hotel room: well-appointed and stocked with everything we would need. Unlike a hotel room, our cabin also came with a cabin steward. The steward seemed to materialize out of thin air shortly after we stepped into our cabin. He introduced himself and asked if we needed anything.

 Cabin stewards clean and service the cabins assigned to them. It was like having a guardian angel watching over us. We never had to ask for extra towels, and on more than one occasion we found them on the bed, folded to resemble an animal such as a dog or elephant. While smoothing the wrinkles out of the bed sheets, he occasionally left chocolate candies on the pillows. Each morning, he left that day’s activity itinerary and dining room menu in the mailbox next to our door.

Instead of packing and unpacking while the ship carried us from one city to the next, we attended presentations, activities, and recitals. When we wanted to relax, we took advantage of a small library and lounge chairs in the ship’s Crow’s Nest Lounge.

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Steamrolled

Jan14

My family had spent Christmas Eve with Mom and my brothers, Billy and Casper. On Christmas Day we stayed home and relaxed. The following day I stopped by to visit Mom with my two daughters in tow.

At ninety years of age, visiting Mom on the family farm sometimes made me feel like I was stepping back in time. This feeling was especially acute during Christmas visits. My two bachelor brothers lived with her in the farmhouse that I had grown up in. When she was no longer able to bake for Christmas, she directed my brothers to make the one favorite spice cookie everyone liked. As in my childhood, the kitchen radio was tuned to a local station from sun-up until it went off the air at sun-down.

After happily greeting Grammie, my teenaged daughters, who had followed me into the living room, sat down on the sofa. Sitting down in a chair closer to Mom, I commented, “You look cozy snuggled in your chair.”

Silver tinsel on the Christmas tree branches glittered in the daylight. Mirror ornaments on the tree reflected nearby balsam branches and other ornaments. Mom sat in her recliner with a small lap-robe covering her lap. Her white hair had tight curls because I’d taken her to have a perm only a few weeks earlier.

Mom requested, “’Would you plug in the tree lights for me?” My movement made the tinsel sway. A draft from the furnace made the mirror ornaments twist and reflect a kaleidoscope of lights.

I asked, “How was your Christmas Day?”

Mom eagerly shared, “It was beautiful and relaxing. Billy played his new Christmas Mannheim Steamroller CD for me after supper. The only lights we had on were the Christmas tree lights. We enjoyed listening to the song ‘Silent Night’ so much, that Billy put it on repeat.”

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Imaginary Kittens

Jan7

The mother cat and babies cuddled together on a soft mattress next to a window. They calmly watched Tammie and I slowly approach them. Two of the babies wore gray and white coats, one had an all-gray coat. Seeing one of the gray and white kittens sit up, I reached down and scooped her up. After a brief struggle to escape, the kitten became still until I turned to look at an all-gray kitten that Tammie had in her arms. Then, the little gray and white in my arms used my distraction to escape.

The animal shelter worker smilingly informed us, “We are having a special this weekend where you can adopt two animals for the price of one.”

My daughter put down the gray kitten and mused, “My older cat, Lucy, might not warm up to a kitten, so maybe I should get two, so they can play with each other. But is my house big enough for three cats?”

Tammie chose to adopt two siblings: a gray and white kitten that resembled the cat Tammie had at home and the all-gray kitten. The shelter worker picked up the three-month-old babies and touched their noses to their mother’s nose to properly have them say goodbye to each other.

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Yuletide Beast

Dec17

The bushy balsam looked as if it was bringing itself into the house. Stomping through the dining room and into the living room, the tree boughs bounced when it stopped and a voice requested, “Help me with the tree stand.” As the tree turned to settle onto the floor in the corner of the room, I finally saw Arnie, my husband. Pulling the tree away from the wall a little, he pointed out, “I think the best side of the tree is facing the room. All I need, is for you to hold the tree steady while I tighten the screws.”

Fresh balsam scent and the aura of cold clinging to the tree’s gray branches and trunk began to mingle with the warmth of the living room. Racing downstairs and into the living room, my nine-year-old daughter Tammie exclaimed, “I could smell the tree from upstairs!” Her thirteen-year-old sister Niki entered the living room a little slower, but with a happy smile.

Flicker, our tuxedo tom cat crept slowly around the outer perimeter of the living room. His black nose twitched; the smell of outdoors to now suddenly be indoors seemed to make him nervous.

By the time our Christmas tree was fully decorated later that afternoon, Flicker came to accept the new feature to our living room. As evening advanced, he seemed enamored with the tree, making a spot under one of the lowest boughs his favorite place to nap. It wasn’t until bedtime that I could see we had a problem. As Tammie walked past the tree, Flicker reached out with his long kitty arms and snagged her ankle with a claw. She let out a yelp.

I scolded, “Naughty kitty! Niki, you’d better put him out in the entryway for the night.”

Niki reached under the tree and scooped up the cat. Petting and cuddling him, she commented, “Look at Flicker! His eyes are crazy looking.”

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Girl Meets Country

Sep10

The realtor placed two sheets of paper on the table in front of Arnie and me. He explained, “I’m going to take you to see these two houses this afternoon. Before we leave the office, you might want to look at the spec sheets. You’ll notice both houses are in the countryside, and both have the number of bedrooms, bathrooms and the backyard you want.”  

Each sheet bore the picture of a house for sale. Below the picture was information about the house. One had fifteen hundred square feet of living space, the other had two thousand. One house had a new roof and with the other a new water heater. The yearly property taxes listed for either property made my eyes water.  

Both houses looked nice, but I had trouble taking my eyes off the brick house. It looked inviting, warm, and friendly. My gut feeling was that it looked like a home…my home. When we toured it, Arnie and I liked what we saw, despite its many faults. The house was built over fifty years before I was born. Some remodeling had been done, some of it very poorly. It was branded with the colors and products of the 1970’s mobile home industry. Most shocking to me, was that the house had two furnaces! One was an oil furnace, and the other was a wood furnace.

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