Cooking the NYTimes and Other Assorted Retirement Activities

  Recently I heard some younger than me radio commentators question the need for Christmas cards.  Their rationale for not sending cards included the following: 1. Nothing of worth comes via snail mail any longer.  Communications are conducted primarily, if not exclusively, through text, messenger, email. 2. Everyone is on social media.  Throughout the year, everyone has shared with everyone else anything of note happening in their lives, thus negating the need for not only a card, but also the often mocked Christmas letter.  If you already know what's happened during the past year, why regurgitate it in a Christmas letter often populated with adjectives of excess (the best!  most wonderful!  amazing!  so blessed!). 3.  Cards themselves require a fair amount of time to create, if in fact you don't simply purchase a box of cards at the local Hallmark or Target or Walmart.  First you need to choose a company which produces photo cards, the...

  Lately, I've been thinking about my mom and dad.  Thinking about them a lot.  And I am thankful for the infrastructure and scaffolding they built, because I see and feel it in so many different ways.  I think about how much they would enjoy their grandchildren and now their great grandchildren, my dad in particular.  He would, I imagine, have great patience with Jackson, his oldest great grandson who has special needs.  I believe he would delight in each developmental step Jack takes, although I think he would tire quickly of Jack's echolalia and some other quirks of his cognitive disability.  I mean, let's not make the guy a saint--but since he's dead, maybe he is.  He would delight in how smart Beau and Ethan are, be excited at their burgeoning interest in sports, especially baseball.  My dad would laugh aloud at the kindergarten humor of Jameson and Ace.  And his great granddaughters, Millie, Sloane and Georgia, would have him wrapp...

  A few years ago, Dan and I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, where there was a special exhibit entitled, "They Were Our Neighbors."  Holocaust survivors voices told their stories of how their Christian neighbors, people with whom they shared meals, the highs and lows of life, whose children went to school and played together, turned them over to the Nazis with a ring of the doorbell. "Are the people who live next door to you Jewish?" "Yes, they are." This story has haunted me for years.  I have long wondered how I might have reacted if I was the Catholic Pole living next door to the Jewish Pole, and had heard from friends and family that if I didn't give up my Jewish neighbor, me and mine would be taken into custody by the Nazis along with the neighborhood Jewish families.  Could I have stood strong by their side?  Would it have been considered caving in if my choice was to protect my family in lieu of theirs? I'm writing about this...

  Social media sites are teeming this week with what feels like obligatory first day of school photos.  Were I to paw through my photo albums (yes, I still have albums and indeed I recognize the photographs should be transferred to digital format), I'd uncover the obligatory first day of school photos I took of my children, standing in front of the house, smiling at their mother's urging.  So, nothing new. For documentation purposes, here are the 8 grands on their first day... Jackson, 6th grade Beau, 4th grade Ethan, 4th grade and Millie, 8th grade Georgia, 3rd grade Sloane, 3rd grade I want to focus on these two guys, however.  They are the end of the era for me--the end of the preschool years that began with my taking the Grands to Early Childhood Family Education (ECFE) classes; transporting them to and from various preschools, experiencing the joy of pick up when they hollered, "Grandma!" and jumped into my arms as if I was the best thing they'd seen.  Ever...

  A few of the local trees are beginning to show the first inklings of fall, leaves fading from green to early shades of yellow.  And it smells like late summer--a distinctive smell I recall from childhood, a scent that followed me home from school on those first few weeks when you raced home in a hurry to change out of the Catholic School uniform into shorts because it was still warm and light enough to play outside until dinner.  The shadows on our deck are growing longer.  The squirrels scamper around with nuts tucked between their jaws.   Yep, it's time to wrap summer up and put a bow on it. We had such a blissful summer, leisurely hours spent with those we love, wedding celebrations for family and friends, reunions and reconnections, time spent on the road and in the air.  Primarily for myself, but also for your reading pleasure, I thought I'd recap May through August. Following our return drive from Florida April 28, we flew to Chicago for the we...

                                                                                       Krka National Park Yesterday Dan and I drove up through the mountains to Krka National Park .  Click on the link.  It's well worth your time. We've had the opportunity to visit a number of America's stunningly beautiful national parks (see previous blog posts, including Thank You, Theodore Roosevelt), so were very much looking forward to going here.  It was a relatively short drive from Kastel Stari where we're staying and very scenic on the way up and over the mountains, including an incredible view of the Kastels area. I'll let the photos do the blogging. Welcome to Krka!  There are two main entrances into the park and we ch...

                                                                                                 The House Yesterday was a rather mellow day.  We had breakfast at a nice cafe on the beach at Kastel Stari, then headed back to the house where, at one point, just Bill, My Friend Jeanie, Dan and I were in the jacuzzi (not really a hot tub) part of the pool, all by our lonesomes, no adult children, no grands.  It was rather nice.   Luise Lumma, one of Jeanie's German grands, offered to make dinner tonight.  Luise is 12, so with her parents and older siblings assistance, she made her favorite dinner: fish sticks, mashed potatoes, salad, creamed spinach.  It was delicious! ...