Lasagna Birthday Dinner

 

From the basement where I had begun to fill the washing machine I heard the phone upstairs ringing followed by my Aunt’s voice saying something into the answering machine about my birthday being tomorrow.  I picked up the receiver of the wall phone, which is connected, but doesn’t work for more than a few minutes once the connection is made.  It stayed on long enough for her to hear me say I’d still be in the basement for another 40 or so minutes.  

After running the laundry and filling the dryer and starting that, I went back upstairs and returned her call.  She invited me for lasagna dinner the next day and, of course, I happily accepted, saying I did have an afternoon medical appointment first.  

The weather has been more than agreeable, with the full spectrum of autumn leaves finally reaching their peak of reds, yellows and oranges.  The cardiologist told me I was five pounds heavier than a year ago, but not to worry about that at lasagna dinner, but return to the diet tomorrow.  Of course! 

Not only was the meal great, so was the company. My aunt’s long time friend from their real estate days joined us and my cousin, Tom was in and out.  The evening slipped away and my aunt sent me off with enough lasagna for three more meals, so, I’d say that was one happy birthday!

My Current Location

Ba-dump Ba-dump Ba-dump Ba-dump is the approximate sound a wheel chair full of me emits as it was pushed across the cobble-stone like walkway between the three main buildings on the campus of E.W.T.N. down in Birmingham, Alabama earlier this month by Karen. 

Thankfully she, a retired teacher a couple of decades my junior, was willing and able to do this repeat performance, from our first trip there two years earlier with the St. Padre Pio Prayer Group of Cleveland.  The eleven hour bus ride passes quickly enough as we  are all chatting, praying, eating, drinking water and making a few pit stops en route.  

The first is in Cincinnati, where we change drivers and shift direction from west to south. On Karen’s cell phone map it looks like a ruler straight line down to our destination Thankfully, we were far enough inland to be safe from any of the trecherous weather systems destroying so much along Florida and the Carolina paths.

The weather was perfect, comfortable, sunny, no rain, and we arrived at the hotel by the skin of our teeth on time for dinner before the kitchen closed for the day. Heaven knows we did not want to miss a meal. 

The agenda kept us pretty busy with services and lectures, one very touching healing service, attendance in a live televised broadcast, visits to the gift shop and a few special meals out of the hotel. The experience of one of these pilgrimages never fails to touch our hearts and leaves us with an assurance that we have had a unique spiritual event that can only increase the personal growth of every individual on the trip.

Mid-October is usually considered peak season for fall foliage assorted reds, oranges, yellows, but this year most trees were densely covered in green for two weeks after we returned.

Delicious Italian Festa

Soft red hues edge the leaves of the flame bush in front of my home. A delicate wash of yellow has painted some leaves on the tree that fills a bedroom window.  Small grey clouds scuttle by.  The air is a expected to be bit cooler this week as the calendar indicates the official onset of fall in two days.

While I was still fastening myself into my seatbelt, after the festa celebrating the feast day of St. Padre Pio, Karen, my traveling companion for next month’s bus trip down to EWTN in Birmingham, Alabama, stepped up to my car and we chatted for a few minutes. Darkness was closing in on the fading day.  

As I slowly drove out  of the church parking lot a few sprinkles dotted my windshield. Thankfully the rain did not come down hard until later in the evening as I turned on the television and  the after taste of the great home cooked Italian dinner reminded me of the pleasant afternoon and dinner I enjoyed with friends there.

The changes of weather are a gentle prod reminding us to get on with chores that need to be completed before too many more weeks fade into the past summer

The Phantom Still Reigns

Every time the local PBS  launches a new  program requesting donations, they disrupt the normal television schedule. In place of my favorites, they usually run assorted musical productions, which I always surf past choosing to watch some tolerable but not great presentation.  This past week, however, I stopped to hear several old favorites by Art Garfunkle, a beautiful voice I have never tired of listeninging to.  

Another evening I was captivated with a stunning performance by four singers of a medley of tunes from The Phantom of the Opera. I don’t normally attend any production more than once, but I accompanied my cousin to see this wonderful show featuring the daughter of one of her opera friends as the female lead in Buffalo, New York and again I saw the show in Cleveland, featuring the same leading couple.  If the opportunity would have come to see it again, I’d still say yes.  

One of our many cousins invited us for a few days of cabin camping up in Michigan and we headed out in her car, my saying I brought ham sandwiches and her adding that she brought watermelon and drinks.  Food is a high priority  with all in our family, we stashed our meal and hit the road.  

Once on the highway she asked me to reach behind her seat and get her a drink. Wedged between both front seats I noticed a watermelon rolling around on the floor behind the driver’s seat which caused me a fit of giggles, asking if that was the watermelon she spoke of. Were we going to use our plastic cutlery or just take turns chomping into it?  I was used to her always having a bowl of melon balls, or to slice the fruit up. She said she did bring a big knife. I opened and passed a bottle of juice.  So began one of many road trips together.

After an enjoyable few days, we were flying back down the road home when a couple of young guys passed us, radio blasting as their vehicle bounced by.  No, you guys are wrong thinking you can out do an opera singer and in moments we went flying past them, her radio music much louder accompanied by us as we both belted out one of the well known tunes from The Phantom of the Opera and we lost them in our rear view mirror.

Close to the corn

Every summer my father planted corn in our backyard garden.  When his sister, next in age to himself and her husband bought a small farm in West Salem, Ohio, everyone in the family took turns spending time there including my sister and I.  Having gone on hay rides, picked and shucked truckloads of corn with all available hands, and probably eaten every respectable Ohioan’s fair share of corn, I thought I knew what there was to know about corn. 

That aunt and uncle raised six children there and one image seared into my memory was of my cousin, Jerry, the eldest sitting on a small tractor, chin in hand, looking none too happy to be there, shirtless in the blazing sun as he plowed the field, we  pulled onto their property.  

In later years the fields were rented out to full-time local farmers who grew corn and soy beans while my uncle continued to drive forty miles each way to and from his full time job at one of the auto industry giants in Cleveland.  

Many stories, including animals escaping the barn, geese eating shrubs, cousin Richie riding on a sow, me hanging onto the badly saddled horse until it succeeded in dismounting me still circulate. 

Decades later after not seeing him in that many years, my cousin Ronnie , convulsing with laughter dredged up that memory.  I remember Aunt Phil yelling out a window before my landing “…no wonder your father won’t let you drive!…”.  What she did not know was that he had me behind the wheel before I was of age for a driver’s permit.  

When neighbors who had spent most of the last year in Nebraska said locals told them that their humidity and rain was caused by the abundance of locally grown corn, I was quick to say, “Naw…” only to hear on a news program  since then that, in fact, corn inside the husk does contain moisture.

Where are we going???

If you want to know where the future will take us, it has been said, read science fiction.  I don’t remember when I first began reading sci-fi, but the magnet may have been a short story by Issac Asimov called Found, followed by his Foundation series and then what is referred to as Science Fantasy, mostly the works of Terry Brooks. The main difference between those genres seems to be that the stories in sci-fi may be based on science and could possibly happen, where science fantasy is just fantasy and not at all possible.  

My father used to marvel at stars in the night skies and pointed out constellations of the big and little dippers, and with awe in his voice talked about black holes, now a given.  He never said he saw any unidentified objects, though every third week he worked the third shift and drove to and from work in darkness. 

He got me interested in a local group called Cleveland Ufology Project, which I attended meetings for so regularly, they asked me to take on the position of secretary, which I held for nine years, writing meeting notes and posting them on the website for members and anyone interested, to read.  In 2009 I travelled with the group to the X Conference and another time to the Serpent Mound near Columbus, Ohio.  

I do believe that beings from other worlds are blended into our society but we cannot discern them.  One of the ladies I have kept in touch with, though Covid shut us down, once related a story that has added to my belief system. 

There was a young woman   with a persistent cough working at a large local hospital.  One day, a man she had seen there pretty regularly but whom she did not know, offered to help her with the cough. He pressed his thumbs on either side of her collar bone. The cough was gone and she asked, “What have you done to me?”  No answer and I do not know if she saw him again.  

These days I am a regular viewer of Star Trek programs as well as Stargate 1.  Who knows?  About a week ago I contacted my friend from the UFO group to ask if she heard the news item that a Stargate like object had been found in Antarctica. She had not, but would look into it and returned to me stating that it was not true. 

Still niggling at me, I did a Google search to find several entries, suggesting that such a thing had been found there and was thought to have been built by an ancient advanced civilization over ten thousand years ago. 

Rain, more rain, snow, ice age?

Slowly rising from the depths of sleep, I see flashes of lightning through the dark drape and the hear the downpour of rain predicted to begin hours earlier.  

Whenever the rainfall is more than just a light shower, the words of a geology teacher come to mind:  First there is rain, more rain, then snow which triggers the next ice age.  I usually console myself with, “Oh, I’ll be long gone!” 

Then on one of the tv science programs I learned that in reality, an ice age can roll along and launch fairly quickly, considering the normal incredibly slow movement of geological time.  

One of my  thoughts was, what would we eat?  No mastodons in my neighborhood, could the local guys gather their hunting spears and bravado to feed the neighborhood?  Would they? How long would my canned goods last?

However, there are conflicting theories, according to Wikipedia.  They suggest that ice ages occur about every 41,000 years and it has only been 11,000 since the last one.  Whew.  

Shared Interest

One of my co-workers at the theater told me about a group then called The Greater Cleveland League of Poets and Writers, where classes were available for reasonable fees.  As soon as possible I found my way there and joined a memoir writing class.  It was there I first met Claudia.  

The class ended, the group became The Lit and moved downtown. Although going home always found me lost in the tangle of streets of Shaker Heights, I simply do not drive downtown, so no longer enjoy events offered by The Lit.  

However, Claudia and I stayed in touch and I briefly attended a writing critique group and later when she started weekend gatherings called Word Lovers Retreat, at a bed and breakfast facility in one of the century houses called Idlywild  in the Methodist community of Lakeside (a Chautauqua Village), considerably smaller than the one in New York State where I’ve been with my traveling companion cousin. but just as charming.   

Some of the attendees came spring and autumn year after year and I finally got into the habit of doing so as well.  Once we resumed after the pandemic settled down, she asked if I really wanted to make that drive alone, and I accepted her offer to drive us both from her home.  

Although a few of us managed to get together for lunch once in awhile it did not happen often.  We agreed to meet a week or so ago, but having just returned from a vacation with her husband, she asked to push the date a bit, which was fine, and ended with her inviting me and another regular to her home for dinner this past week.  

The only discount bookstore left is nearby so  I stopped there first, buying 3 books of poetry and then pulling into the drive fifteen minutes late.  

The meal on the patio was delicious and the hours filled with talk about words and experiences, laughter, and warm air, visits by the family dog, Gracie, and dark  skies closing daylight.  The drive home was easier since there was less traffic midweek.

Keeping in Touch

A phone call from one of our former neighbors asking if a short visit this evening would be okay, really brightened my day.  They were just in town for the summer before all five of them were set to go to Africa for a stint of time. The dad has been to Togo, a country on the West Coast of Africa, as a medical doctor, a couple of times.   

The  evening slipped away so quickly and I loved meeting the youngest member of the family who gave us all a grand smile from the comfort of his carrier seat on the floor.  Big sister, ever curious and absorbing new input, looks like a doll, but my money would be on her as the next doctor in the house.  

Middle brother soon eyed a mask made of plaster of Paris  covered with papier mache  and painted black, eye spaces and mouth highlighted in gold, made by my daughter in high school art class.  Pointing at it warily he asked, “What’s that?”  A moment later declaring, “I don’t like him!”  His dad turned the mask showing that it was not a real person, but that did not change his mind.  

It reminded me of when I saw a coconut with a grotesque face carved on it hanging from the ceiling of the room where my youngest aunt and I were trying to sleep.  I did not like that thing either. 

Tiring Conundrum

Everyone who crosses your path in life, does so for some reason, the adage implies. Recently I have begun to wonder about an individual who did make a difference in my routine and about the time I imagined that there was nothing more to it, another brief, barely apparent crossing. 

The lesson would be??? I seem slightly stunned, where are all my words? It is rare for this wordsmith to be tongue-tied.  The sand in the hourglass never stops running as I try to regain composure, remind myself to put one foot in front of the other, keep moving. 

Have we exchanged roles and am I now the teacher?