Molecule Failure

From time to time at the end of the day it seems as if my molecules just collapse.  No matter what I should be doing, my body just. won't. move.  That's what happened at the end of the day yesterday.  It's not that it was a particularly energetic day, just eventful.  

Ned came at 9 with bagels to celebrate Fathers Day and we had a nice visit before he left to go and visit his grandmother.  Walt and I were delighted to be headed off to San Francisco, hoping to escape the predicted 107⁰ temperatures here.  We were headed to the Presentation theater, old home of The Lamplighters, for a memorial to Orva Hoskinson, co-founder of the company and "father" to hundreds of performers who have trod the Lamplighters boards over the years.  A cool breeze greeted me as I got out of the car.  How wonderful!

The stage was set with a display of Orva's costume for his iconic role of Bunthorne, the fleshly poet, in Gilbert & Sullivan's Patience. 

While Orva performed all of his life and performed and directed not only Gilbert & Sullivan, but opera, operetta, recitals, etc. (as a recording of "Donna non vidi Mai" from Manon Lescaut recorded in 1958 with LeRoy Miller accompanying, which began the memorial demonstrated) for Lamplighters, he will forever be remembered for his Bunthorne, of which one San Francisco Chronicle critic once wrote "There is Gielgud's Hamlet, and there is Hoskinson's Bunthorne."

There followed a parade of memorials interspersed with performances and film clips of Orva in performance that was an emotional roller coaster. But it was absolutely perfect and I think Orva would have approved

The memories started out with a song, written by co-founder Ann MacNab (unable, because of health problems to attend) to celebrate Orva.  It was perfect "Ann."

"The World is a Broken Toy" from Princess Ida brought tears from many remembering that the Lamplighters have lost FIVE in the last year.  In addition to Orva there was patterman/board chairman John Vlahos, the marvelous soprano, Rosemary Bock, patterman John Rouse, and Patience Bauman, daughter of two Lamplighters who met and married in the company.  Patience also performed in Lamplighters choruses.

Rick Williams, patterman, and soprano Jane Hammett recreated Orva's staging for "I have a song to sing o" from Yeomen of the Guard.  Rick also gave a shout-out to myself and Alison Lewis for writing the Lamplighters history, which was very sweet of him.

The afternoon continued through memories, laughs, tears, and, at the end, hugs.  (Highlight was a marvelous video montage by Judy Epstein, which will be uploaded to YouTube today.  Who knew Ova once had hair?)  Someone even remembered the incident (recorded in Arthur Bloomfield's History of the San Francisco Opera) when Orva streaked a production of The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein, on suggestion of then-director Kurt Adler.  (Three people at the memorial remembered being in the Opera House audience to see it.) Then there was a reception at the Lamplighters World Headquarters, which we also attended, not wanting to leave the cool air of San Francisco and head home!

When we finally got into the car, we decided to find some place to eat, for Fathers Day.  It took four tries before we finally found someplace that could take us without a reservation.  We tried Spengers Fish Grotto in Berkeley, but they turned us away, then Skates, on the Berkeley Marina, where we had gone with Caroline when she was here, but there was such a line of people waiting, I didn't even ask if they could take us.  Lowering our standards we tried Sizzler, a bit farther toward home, but they had a long line waiting and few tables open, so on we went to Denny's in Cordelia.  It wasn't anything fancy, but at least there was no line!  

We were now back in the heat again, though. I had told Walt I would drive home from Denny's, but my molecules started fading before I had finished my steak (which I brought home and he said he would drive.  I think I was asleep before we got on the freeway and barely awake long enough to stumble in the house and collapsed into the recliner.  Walt fed the dogs.

But it was a memorable day and I think even though it was an unusual Fathers Day, Walt enjoyed himself.

Flashbacks

At intermission of the matinee of The Music Man, I sent a text to Jeri which said "I'm probably the only person in the world who cries through 'Wells Fargo Wagon.'"

When we got into the car after the show, we both agreed it had been a good show and that we enjoyed it.  "But there are still flashbacks," Walt said, saying "Sadder but wiser girl" always got to him.

I've always thought of The Music Man as our "family show."

It was the very first "big show" that Paul ever did.  He played Winthrop, the little kid who sings "Gary, Indiana."  Jeri was Amarylis in that production, the girl who takes piano lessons from Marian the Librarian and joins her in singing "Good Night My Someone."

Later that same year, Paul was cast to play Winthrop again in a production at a huge amphitheater in Oakland. He stayed with friends of ours who had suggested he audition for the part during rehearsal and the show itself.  When their awards ceremony came around, he was one of the kids nominated as "Best Child Actor," and won.

When he got older, he played Tommy Djilas, the boy from the wrong side of the tracks, who "almost invented perpetual motion."

In his last monologue show, he did Harold Hill's song, "Trouble," and I always thought it would be funny if someday he played Harold Hill...and then later, when he was much older, Mayor Shinn, so that he could have spanned his whole life with The Music Man ... but he died first.

You'd think it would be difficult for me to see "Gary, Indiana," but it's not.  There are so many cute kids who play Winthrop and the kid yesterday was adorable, so I enjoy the performance, not the memories.  But when the finale of Act 1 comes on and they sing "Wells Fargo Wagon" and Winthrop has his big solo wondering if there could be "thomething thpecial jutht for me" I picture 10 year old Paul taking center stage and I just lose it every time.  I sat there yesterday with tears rolling down my cheeks, trying to wipe them away before the lights came up for intermission.

For Walt, his difficult memory is the duet Harold sings with his old pal Marcellus, "Sadder but Wiser Girl" because he is remembering the high school jazz choir days when Paul and his friend Kag performed that song.

So Music Man is always a mixed bag.  It is probably my favorite musical, but it is also the one that is fraught with the most memories.  And what better way to spend Father's Day than seeing "the family musical"?

The show ended at 5 and we had been invited to join family at Marta's sister's house for a Father's Day barbeque.  Since it was a very hot day, I didn't want to bring food to share and have it sit in a hot car for 2-1/2 hours, so we stopped for food after the show.  I also took the opportunity to run to Office Max, next door to Safeway, to pick up another box for the office.

Dinner is always fun and celebrates the four dads in the group.

That would be Marta's Dad, her sister's father-in-law, Walt and Marta's brother-in-law.  

So it was a good day and as we left for home, there was a gorgeous sunset in the sky.

Earlier in the day, I had stopped by Atria to deliver a gorgeous basket of red carnations I had found at Michael's for my mother.  They look so real and they won't die on her, which is always a plus.  She was unintentionally funny today and though on the one hand it was sad, on the other hand, I couldn't help but laugh at what happened.

I found her sitting in the hall outside the dining room, where the men--fathers and their grown up sons--were stopping by a big bin of bow ties, gift for all the fathers going to lunch.  "I'm getting too old and I don't know what's going on any more," she said, as I explained to her more than once that it was Father's Day and the ties were for all the Dads.

After awhile we went to her apartment.  I had her pills for next week to leave for her and I was fairly certain that if I left her sitting in the hall, she would not remember to take the flowers with her when she went back to her apartment.  And I was right, because even when I reminded her to take them, her reaction was "Oh?  Are those for me?"

We got to the apartment and I went to put her pills in the bathroom, where I always leave them.  I saw that the previous week's pill box still had two days' worth of pills in it.  It had been 3 days since I was last there and when I was there, there were two days' worth of pills not yet taken, so she hasn't been taking her pills.

I confronted her with it (which is always pointless, but somehow I need to do it).  "There are two days worth of pills in there so I know you haven't been taking your pills," I said.

She got defensive and then said "OK...I'll take one NOW."

She got herself a glass of water, and two cookies and went to sit down and dutifully eat her cookies.  I got her pills and handed them to her.  "What are those?" she asked, and then said "Oh...do I take pills?"

I'm going to have to monitor her more closely to make sure she is taking the pills, which means going to Atria more often.  But I had to admit that I got a good chuckle out of her thinking that she was doing what she was supposed to do by eating two cookies with her glass of water.

Celebrating Dads

It was a busy day, only some of which celebrated Fathers day.

Walt went off to Mass while I boiled up a mess of eggs for stuffed eggs later.  When he got home, I made him blueberry waffles (from scratch -- woohoo!).

Then I set to work making the stuffing for a dozen and a half hard boiled eggs.  Usually I use mayonnaise and garlic powder, but when I did that last time it was way too salty, so this time I used mayonnaise and a tiny bit of cumin, which I decided I liked very much.  It added just enough flavor that it tasted different, but you might not be able to put your finger on why.  Everyone seemed to enjoy them.

Then there was another fruit salad to make, using the fruit left over from Al's birthday party of the day before (minus blueberries, which went into the waffles).  I had watched Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman on the Food Network make a fruit salad, to which she added a bit of a syrup which coated the fruit and made it look pretty, so I decided to try that, boiling up sugar and water along with the rind of an orange and the juice of half of it.

It did add a nice flavor to the salad, but as I poured it over, I was reminded that Drummond lives in Oklahoma, which may be one of those states that don't get the flavorful fruits that we have here and wondered if maybe I was gilding the lily.  But no matter.  It tasted good.

Then it was time to finish folding my mother's laundry and get it over to her before she is forced to go commando around Atria.  Sunday afternoon must be the time to go.  There was TONS of parking.  3 slots in the Atria guest parking area (where there is usually nothing), and lots of on-street parking.  Walt pointed out that the UCD students are also on break so that might account for all that wonderful parking space.

My mother is looking more and more tired.  She's old, you know :)  But she really is seeming it these days.  Today she said she felt "strange" and couldn't describe how she felt, but that it was different.  I have the feeling that I'm starting to watch her fading away.

After I got home from Atria, Walt and I gathered up the stuffed eggs and fruit salad and headed over to Marta's step-sister Lindsay's home, where they were having a gathering of all the dads in the family.  Lindsay's sister was there with her daughter Alexis, almost 2, who was one of the cutest toddlers ever.

(with Lindsay's daughter, Isabella)

There was a nice barbeque dinner and then everyone gathered in front of the house to take the Dads group photo.  

As I sat there I discovered I was sitting under a rare Davis shoe tree.

We said our goodbyes and came home and now, in the middle of the night, I'm trying to finish off a review I started this afternoon, and didn't complete.

In the morning I must get Sheila to the vet's because her leg is very swollen and she's having difficulty walking.

The Sound of Silence

Years ago, Walt made it very easy for me to plan for Father's Day.  He declared that I was not his mother, so there was no point in his doing anything for me on Mother's Day (though he has sometimes). Mother's Day and Father's Days were days for the kids to honor him or me, so I don't make a big deal about Father's Day, but the dogs give him cards.  I absolutely LOVE the card from Sheila this year.

Ned is out of town this Father's Day, so there was no family thing, though he has promised to treat his father to a beer at the local brew pub when he returns.

I planned to make one of his favorite dinners (Burgundy Beef Balls) for dinner, but then forgot to make coffee for him when he was out at Mass this morning.   Bad me!

Mother's Day and Father's Day were big holidays when I was growing up.  We always shopped for my father and he always got some sort of flimsy lingerie for my mother on Mother's Day (I suspect that was a gift more for him than for my mother!).  He, my sister and I would sneak down into the basement and I would wrap his gift for my mother since he was terrible at wrapping and wrapping was one of the things I did best (I loved making ribbon roses and fancy bows).

There was always a big family dinner because we did everything with my grandparents (my father's parents).

As I look at Facebook this morning there are glowing tributes to people's fathers.

• "Thinking about my father on his special day. So much of who I am, at least the good things, is because of him. Miss you, Dad!"
• Happy Father's Day to my Daddy. Gone 13 years, but never forgotten.
• Wishing a very happy Father's Day to a fantastic Dad who I love very much... I miss you very much.
• A special shout out to my dad, who always answers my calls, even at midnight when my car is broken down and loves me no matter what. Being your little girl makes me a better person.
• Happy Father's Day, Dere Papa. First Father's Day without you - I sure do miss you. Thanks for giving me your love of nature, adventure and an ever-lasting curiosity about life.

I wish I could have written any of those sentiments. But then I came to an entry which resonated with me.   This woman is mentally challenged, but maybe one of the smartest women around.

Your turn. I'm going. To be honest. With you. You hurt. My feelings. And other people's. Feelings too. When I. Was told. Of what. You did. It was. Hard to believe. Because I did. Not understand. Now I do. How could. You ever. Do the. Things you did. To everyone that. Loves you. And also. I was. So upset. With you. You did. As you pleased. Because you thought. It would not. Hurt anyones feelings. Well I'm. Sad to say. It did.  

I could have written that entry.  "How could you ever do the things you did to everyone that (wants to) love you." Her entry went on to talk about the good things she remembered about her father, but she obviously has a lot of hurt memories too.

I wanted to write an entry about my father for Father's Day but it's very difficult to do, as difficult as it was, each year, to pick out a card that did not have an "I love you" sentiment, but something funny that included liquor.  

He was not all bad.  He was a good provider. He didn't beat or abuse me.  We had a lot of fun times and there were tender moments--I think about the times we would be on empty country roads when he would put me in his lap and let me steer the car while he controlled the gas pedal because I was too small to reach the floor (now, as a parent, I'm appalled at the potential danger, but I remember it as a nice thing to do with him). 

I don't know why one of my strongest memories was having "taste tests" of foods.  Milk in particular.  He would go out into the back porch, which had a window into the kitchen.  Karen and I would pour out two different brands of milk and hand them to him through the window, one at a time. He would taste them and see which he liked better.  Of course he always picked the richest, the one with the most fat.   Funny how strong a memory that is when so many others have disappeared.

But when I try to think of the fun times, I think of how they would invariably end--with him yelling at us because we did some little thing wrong or for no reason at all, and how we would be cowering in our beds, afraid of what would happen.  Nothing violent ever happened, but the long silences were terrible, silences caused by something you know you did, but didn't know what it was. Silences that might last hours or days or if you did something REALLY bad (that you didn't know you did), it might last weeks.  And then one day it was all right again and life went on. You didn't really know whose fault it was, but you always assumed it was yours. 

I would like to write about how supportive he was, and how proud of me he was, but he was fond of criticizing things I did and laughing at me when I made a mistake and I don't remember his ever sounding proud of me, or ever saying "I love you..." without that being followed by "...so I want to tell you this about yourseslf..." When I brought him the first Lamplighters book, so proud of it, he glanced at it and then kind of tossed it at me and said "you might as well take this with you because I'll never look at it."

But if I sit here and force myself to think of only the good things and forget the bad, it is because of him that I have a wonderful sense of humor.  He could be the funniest guy in the world, and always the life of the party.  I remember the box of silly hats he had that he would pull out at a party and entertain everyone with (Ned has that box now).  Because of him, I can sing almost any popular song of the 30s and 40s and have a love of music.  This is a guy who should have been a musician instead of a postal worker, because music was his passion and he was never happier than when he was playing the piano, or listening to his jazz records.  He loved pianist Art Tatum the way I loved Judy Garland.

He loved to eat and he loved to cook, and I get my love of food from him.  He didn't cook a lot but when he did it was almost always wonderful (we won't talk about his peanut butter cookies that we had to drink because he did something and the batter had the consistency of skim milk.  We teased him about that all of his life, but he made a calzone that was to die for...I've never had once since that was as good).  He also made the best potato salad in the world and I have never had a potato salad that equalled his.  My mother could sort of make it, but she tended to over-salt it.  If there is something about him that I truly miss, it's his potato salad.

He was madly in love with San Francisco and I get my love of the city from him.   He loved it all of his life until he finally moved to Marin County and then he seemed to forget how much he loved San Francisco.

He loved his grandkids, and the happiest day in his life was the day he could walk with Jeri to the nearby ice cream store and buy her a cone.  He had been talking about doing that ever since I announced I was pregnant. The very last Christmas we had with him was the very best Christmas.  I've mentioned it before here and even included a video.  After years of assuming that he had nothing in common with his growing grandchildren, he suddenly found that they, too, loved jazz and they had a jazz session around the piano, Jeri and my father on the piano, Ned on the drums, Paul on guitar and Tom and David with noisemakers to add to the percussion.  I never saw my father happier.  By that time he was partly paralyzed on one side and couldn't play with his left hand any more and it hurt to sit at the piano bench for a long time, but despite that he was just glowing.

When I think of my father, I try not to think of all the ugly things he said to me before his death and to concentrate on Christmas and remember the person he was on that night and how happy he was to be having a jam session with his grandkids.  I sat there thinking "Finally, I have done something for him that makes him happy."

Happy Father's Day, Daddy--wherever you are.

And Happy Father's Day to Tom, one of the best dads I know.  How could he be otherwise when he learned from the best?  Happy Father's Day, Walt.

Identify Your Knickers

I love having my mother in Davis.  She gets to see Ned more often!  We included her in a Father's Day celebration by going to the Father's Day BBQ at Covell.  Not much of a bbq, but they were grilling strip steaks out in the parking lot and bringing them into the restaurant.  They were downright tasty, and Walt had two.

(someday we're going to teach Ned not to be so
nervous around cameras!  LOL)

Someone from the staff came around distributing bow ties to each of the fathers in the room.  I loved the sight of Ned helping his father put his tie on.

Somehow a bow tie with a plaid shirt does not exactly make a trending fashion statement!

When we had finished brunch, we went back to my mother's apartment where a very weird thing happened.  My mother told me that someone had come into her apartment yesterday and had left their underwear in her bathroom.  I reminded her that I had taken her clothes home yesterday afternoon and washed them and had brought them back that night.  She had a stack of clothes all folded up on a chair, the clothes I had washed, and she swears she had never seen them before and that they belonged to someone else.  I tried to convince her and I will be curious to find out if I actually did because when we left she was still considering taking them to the front desk and telling them that they did not belong to her.

I also started telling Ned and Marta about the goats and the poison ivy at my friend Dair's house and he said that he had seen Dair last week, when she came to visit my mother.  My mother has no memory of their visit.  This morning I found out that Dair and her husband and their granddaughter had come and spent an hour with her. She has absolutely no memory of that at all, and when Dair called to find out if she was going to be home, Ed was there and she told Ed it was "someone trying to sell me something."

The thing that I am wondering now is how long things have been this bad.  I thought I saw her often and Ed saw her often, but seeing her every day is completely different.  I see a lot more and see a lot more of the loss of memory than I ever noticed before and I'm wondering how much of this is due to the whole moving and being in a new place thing and how much was there all along and we never realized it.

Whatever it is, I am so glad that she is somewhere where people are at least aware of her.

Ned & Marta, Walt & I left and went to see Star Trek: Into Darkness.  I had been uninterested in seeing the first Star Trek movie, made in 2009.  Without William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, I didn't see how I could possibly enjoy it, but it was really nice to see, as Ned put it, what an homage to the original series this movie is.  A lot more high tech, of course, but you never lose sight of the original series at all, and the actors playing Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Sulu, and Uhura are just great, and quite believable as their younger selves (the least believable was Uhura, but she was still good).  I came home to find the 2009 Star Trek on OnDemand and will watch that later this week.

Today I took my mother to see The Great Gatsby, which she enjoyed.  She is even starting to recognize things in Davis.  But while she was going to her room to get her key, I asked the front desk if she had turned in some clothes that she said didn't belong to her.  The woman pulled out a box of clothes, which at least did NOT contain the clothes I washed, but contained other clothes that I recognized, because I gave them to her.  This came from a box that she "found" outside her apartment and snickered when she told me she had pushed it to someone else's apartment so nobody thought she was throwing away garbage.  The the box contains her clothes and now I have to go through it and see how much belongs to her and figure out how to take it back into her apartment without having to convince her that they really are her clothes!

Each day is a new adventure.

Family Planning

19 June 2012

We had an encounter with Lady Justice today, and she treated us very well.

After discussing it for some 10-15 years or so, talking about actually making an appointment for 5 years or so, talking with the kids, who asked all the right questions and went over all the financial files with Walt, after Marta offering to find an attorney who could help us with estate planning, we finally met with said attorney and have put the ball in motion.

In fact, Ms. Atty assures me that our estate will be planned and papers signed before we fly off to Prague, so if the plane goes down, the kids won't have to deal with probate.  And they will have our official permission to blow up the house instead of cleaning it out (I don't think that is actually going to be in the estate plan, however--but it's understood!)

The attorney was very nice, very efficient, very knowledgeable -- but then she'd have to be.  I liked her.  She gave us an end of life directive form to go over and sign, and asked a couple of questions we hadn't thought of before which we have to think about, but basically, finally it's done.

I suspect it's very easy to make an estate plan when you don't have scads of money and when your children all like each other and get along well together.   Somehow I can't imagine them fighting over the infamous punchbowl or my collection of Tupperware or my box of junk jewelry.  There might be some discussion over Delicate Pooh ("you take him." "No YOU take him!" ) but in my heart of hearts I think I love the memories of that pile of rags more than my adult children do.

It's also very easy to choose an Executor when you have a relative (Walt's sister) who does that sort of thing for a living and who is married to an attorney.

So that's why this can all be done so quickly and I can cross that little thing off of my bucket list.

After our meeting we went to Great Wall Mongolina BBQ for lunch.   I love that place and my lunch 

---

I think Walt had a nice Father's Day.  Ned's sister-in-law Lindsay and her husband Brad invited their family to come for a BBQ and included us.  

Ned actually did the BBQ-ing, since he isn't a father so he got to take care of those who were.  We had a chance to compare trip stories with Brad's parents on trips we have taken.  We met them on our trip to Russia.  They were on the ship that was a couple of days ahead of us, but we were all in St. Petersburg together and after many attempts we did manage to have lunch with them.  They have made several trips not on Viking since we last met.  They aso visited China, but not with Viking.

The center of attention yesterday was young Charlie, who I think is in his 2's.  He was asleep when we arrived and was kind of groggy when he woke up, so I was able to get some photos of him sitting in his grandpa's lap...

Of course Walt and Marta's father had their usual after-dinner bonding.

And when it was time to go home, Ned and Marta, who recently purchased a little motor scooter, got dude-ed up and headed off toward home.

And Walt got two cards about sleeping on Father's Day.