Fish Tales

Many times when I run into someone I haven't seen in awhile, the first question I'm asked is "Do you have any trips planned?"  Traveling extensively has become a 21st century habit.  Earlier in life, Gary and I were getting by as many younger couples do.  We'd save our tax refund to pay for a car trip.

 

We covered New England from Bar Harbor, Maine, to the shores of Lake Champlain in Vermont.  We would stay in a vacation cottage near Arcadia or in the Green or White Mountains. Sometimes we would find a motel instead.  We always packed a camera, and as time went by, fishing gear and bait.  Gary put together a chart of the best fishing holes along the Kancamagaus Highway.  No, I can't share.  Fishing hole locations are secret, of course. 

 

We would find that zen quiet when sitting by a trout stream, line in the water, waiting for that little jerk telling us our bait had been taken.  With the sun peeking through the leaf cover, and the warm dry air of the mountains, we didn't care that it was the middle of summer and humid at home.  Work worries just melted away, and flowed down the Swift River.

 

These photos are from July, 1992.  Here we are, twenty years younger, thinner, and with much more hair.  We may have gone to more exotic places later, but none were any more fun than sitting by a river, catching fish and scenery, and letting the day flow by.

 

This Wednesday would have been Gary's birthday.  People have  been correct.  The hard edges of loss have softened with time.  I can look back and treasure those lazy summer days and be thankful that we had so many of them.  I can also look forward to more summer days, and making more good memories with the people in my life.

 

The one lesson I think I've learned is that the connections with people and the memories we make are what we can keep over time.  And are the things to be most valued.

 

 

 

Father Christmas ghosts.

The holiday season and the end of the year is typically a time of reflection.  I've been thinking of all the good Christmas's and family get togethers I've attended over the years.  And there's been lots.  For example, there were Christmas mornings when Santa was still real.  The biggest kid my house that morning turned out to be my dad.  He would wake us up and tell us that Santa had arrived, and would sit and watch with a smile as we opened presents.  He was a man of very few words, but his actions would often speak volumes.  He was a hard working, blue collar guy.  He didn't have a profession or career, but a calling.  He was the provider, as my mother was the homemaker.  Different times and different roles, but still important.

As I said, he didn't talk much.  He was often tired, sometimes grouchy, but he did work a zillion hours a week.  Once he retired, though, he opened up a little.  He was more relaxed, I was older and had learned men's small talk (did you see yesterday's game?) and he would sometimes share stories.

He told me one story of when he was a teenager in Saugus, and had a job pumping gas on Route One.  This was before the days of the major interstates, so anyone traveling from New York to Maine had to use "the pike" as all highways were called then.

He had a pair of famous customers who had a summer home in Maine  stop at the gas station one day, Bette Davis and her husband Gary Merrill.  It must have even more impressive back in the 1940's to see a movie star.  Without a 24 hour news cycle, instant tweets, and not even television, stars lived in a different universe than they do today.

He had a more homespun story that makes me smile even now.  Here he was, first generation American, born of Lebanese Catholic parents.  He had been set up on a blind date by his brother and his girl, who had a friend.  The friend was first generation American, the child of Sicilian immigrants.  Things were going well.  And of course, he was invited home for dinner to meet the parents. 

My poor mother was mortified by what her mother served.  Lentils, of all the greenhorn things to serve to someone my mom was getting serious about.  What would he think?  Immigrants back in the early twentieth century did their best to Americanize themselves.  Sofia became Sophie, Caterina became Kitty, and Rosa became Dolly.  The sisters had pride in their American style.  Oh, but the horror of serving lentils was not to be imagined.

My father laughed when he told the story.  He had been brought up on lentils and other similar Mediterrean food.  The subtext he didn't mention was his probable nervousness at meeting the family.  Whether intentional or not, my grandmother Lena put him at ease by serving a dish my grandmother Nady had served him his whole childhood. 

And then Sophie and George in turn served those dishes to their children, my brother John and I.  And keeping the tradition going, John has requested that I bring something Lebanese to dinner Christmas day.  So in a little bit I'll be cooking up some kibbee, and his children and grandchildren will have a little.  Sophie and George's legacy, and their parents' as well, are the dishes we still eat, and the memories we make around them.

Merry Christmas, dad.

French Fairytales