Well, it's almost Christmas, the doubloon has been found, I might get to hibernate after all. Team Ria has been such a plus in our lives....the well wishers from afar have filled my heart. But, what a difference a year makes. Last year on this blog I wrote about our first Christmas on Clay Hill Road, when Maria was five and sick with a fever and she and I stayed up on Christmas Eve, surprising a mouse and laughing about it. Maria wrote on that blog..."one of my favorite memories..because I liked having you to myself on Christmas Eve." That was Maria. Years ago she had a bumper sticker on her car that read "Practice Random Acts of Kindness" and Ria intuitively knew how to do that. Her cards were always perfectly selected and she added the right words, whether in humor or in love. At her funeral my brother pulled out a birthday card she had sent him of an old man holding up an ugly animal, a giant possum, and inside she had written, "The critter on the front is probably the only animal that doesn't live on our third floor." We laughed at that together. Two years ago she gave me a prayer book for Christmas, and had inscribed to "Mom, A copy of Aunt Lillian's prayer book for you with all my Love, Maria" and that was Ria, not just love, but ALL my love. Since her death so many people have sent me cards with her words, always so appropriate and loving or told me of the little things she had sent to them at dark times of their lives. Last night I thought of her before going to sleep, as I usually do, but this time I said in my head, "Good night, Maria, wherever you are" and I had to smile because I remembered Jimmy Durante saying "Good Night Mrs Calabash, wherever you are" at the end of each of his performances. I looked it up today because I thought it must have been someone very dear to him to acknowledge her that way and was surprised at the story. Mrs. Calabash owned a restaurant that he stopped at in Calabash, South Carolina at an early stage in his career. He was impressed with her kindness and as he left he said he would make her famous one day. Her daughter said she didn't even know that she was talking with Jimmy Durante. And so it was that Lucy Coleman became the famous Mrs. Calabash announced in his routine sign off. I guess that just goes to show you that kindness can be repaid, and repaid in a dramatic way. Team Ria's crown will be used in a way that commemorates Maria's spirit of kindness and giving. So this eve of Christmas Eve, I say Merry Christmas and God Bless and Merry Christmas Maria, wherever you are.

Very exciting news...the doubloon has been found and Team Ria will soon be wearing the crown. Sabra has made a website http://www.teamria.blogspot.com where we will be posting information, pictures, etc. and more details of the actual finding of the doubloon by Michael, Laura's husband. Check out the blog for a video of Timmy, Michael and Tony searching the low tide at Catskill.

I've been thinking about hibernation. Last week's paper had a review of a book written by a New Paltz professor about a woman being put into a coma for two weeks to lose weight. It's fiction, but this is entirely possible today with medically induced comas. I'd rather hibernate. Last year the New York Times had an article about human hiberation that was known about in Russia (the people said 7 months of winter, 5 months of hell, so that tells you something about their lives). But the one I was interested in was a town in France which produced wine where the peasants would hibernate once the grapes were harvested and the wine was made. Their work was done for the year and there was no reason to wake up each day. It showed a picture of a family sleeping with their arms around their animals - a cow, sheep and pigs. Rotating, one member of the family would stay awake to tend the fire and the family would wake to eat a piece of stale bread every now and then. A long winter's nap. This appealed to me and I've been drawn to that thought now that the days are gray, darkness comes so early and even the mornings take a while to arrive. Just get under the covers and like Sleeping Beauty, wait until a prince comes to wake you up, a well rested, 30 pounds thinner you, get rid of the animals and get on with life. But, there is Christmas coming faster each day, Team Ria searching for the lost doubloon (our new member, Rob, has been coming up with the greatest ideas - he's found a shipwreck, numerous places to search including a sewer plant, can't miss that) and they called to tell us Maria's stone has come to Red Hook, to be put in place by next week. Sabra asked what does it look like, and the man said it hasn't been uncrated yet....too much going on. I'll hibernate next month.

We've been busy, searching for the lost crown of Captain Kidd. Actually, this was a plan 17 years ago to drum up tourism in Catskill, but failed miserably when a tv show that was featuring the hidden treasure was pulled and never shown. Anyway, for the last month we, Team Ria, have been studying the story and the map, looking for clues. The story goes something like this:

Captain Kidd and his crew of 185, 75 from the city of New York, are sitting in their worm filled boat waiting to find pirates. Instead they see the Quahog Merchant, and decide to become pirates. The ship is full of treasures, gold, fabrics and a diamond filled crown, and a beautiful young girl bound to be married to a rich king. Kidd's second mate, Lad Widerear, falls in love with the girl, who sits around in pantaloons and a camisole and gives him the eye. The rest of the men dress in the fancy clothes and pretend to lay golden eggs. Kidd sees Widerear's interest and gets rid of the girl, takes over the ship, goes back to New York and hides the crown with Lad Widerear 87 miles north of the Statue of Liberty and 36 miles down from Albany. Back in New York Kidd, who has been summoned about his actions, puts on his best dress and tells his first mate Dolton, if you see me drop my hanky, get the hell out of there. When he drops his hanky, Dolton and the crew head back up the Hudson to hide Kidd's share of the booty, before he goes to the brink. They hide the chests of gold doubloons in the same place as the crown, and Dolton asks for a straw from a haystack, takes a needle, puts it in the straw and a small bowl of river water, and laughs as the needle turns north. Then he takes a cross staff and shoots a light at Widerear's end. Perfect he smiles, half of Widerear's age. Aha...now he tells Widerear that he has to stay here with these directions in case Kidd ever comes back. Then the story jumps to the 1900's and a girl name Hannah, escaping the boredom of Catskill finds the crown. Now go and find it. That's all you get.

308 years later Team Ria is in action. Maria and Sam Bellamy, the pirate from the Whydah are sharing a rum coke and are watching from above. "Look at that", Sam says to Maria pointing at the bunch of them running around St. Anthony Friary, "They think they're on to it. Who's the one holding the girl up to the statue of the Blessed Mother, and what is she trying to do?" "Oh, laughed Maria, "That's my brother with Atticus my niece on his shoulders. I think they think the blessed Mother's crown is the doubloon. Oh, wow, Shane is trying to knock the statue down with a big stick. This is getting good." Pirate Sam, interrupted Maria, and pointed in the opposite direction, "And who are those three nuts in the Hudson River in November and what are they trying to do?" Maria turned and laughed out loud. That's my brothers-in-law, Tony and Michael and the white haired guy wearing shorts and no socks, is my mother's fiance. They've been engaged for 22 years now." "And, asked Sam, "What are they doing in the mucky low tides of the river in below freezing weather, in the water?" "Well" explained Maria, "Tim thinks that little piece of land that shows up in the map is Madagascar and he thinks that tidal land is where the treasure is." Sam laughed a hearty laugh, and pointed to a woman on the shore. Maria told him that was her sister Sabra and she was video taping the whole search. And that's my mother and sister Laura in the car watching with the binoculars. Sam turned to Maria, gave her a hug, and said, "You know you're family is nuts, but I am cheering for them." Maria and Black Sam lifted their glass, "Go team Ria, Go."

When Timmy and I are on a long drive, and he's behind the wheel, he likes to find a "happy place", a place on a major three lane highway, that suddenly has no cars in front of you and no cars in back. You relax, look at the scenery, slow down to the speed limit and enjoy the drive. Without the rush of cars passing on either side you are suddenly tension free, if only for a few minutes or even seconds. I have been kind of in a "happy place" since Cape Cod. It started one morning, early about 7:30 I was on Mayo Beach drinking a hot cup of offee, watching the shellmen about their job. Wellfleet Harbor stretched in front of me like a cinematic screen, land, water, Jeremy Point, more water and vast amounts of blue sky. The moon had been full the night before, so it was a very low tide and the men were so far off they looked like toy soldiers, their trucks pulled to the end of the water looked like Matchbox trucks. They moved slowly, some raking their oyster beds, some pulling rowboats filled with burlap bags of oysters and suddenly I felt a peace, a good feeling watching these workers doing a tedious job in slow motion, in cold water. A happy place. Then last week in my writing class at Bard I read my piece on "I knew I grew up when..." a piece that ended with even Maria's death not accomplishing my growing up. The class applauded me, the teacher said excellent and I went out of the room feeling a "happy place". I hate to read in front of people, I inherited the Murphy shyness and this was something hard for me to do and I thought I would cry, but I wore the scarf Maria had made for me, and I think that helped. My happy place continued.

Right now our country is not in a happy place and the result of next Tuesday is all important. Sabra e-mailed me an essay David Sedaris wrote for the New Yorker on voting. He mentions the voters who are undecided and likens it to being on an airplance. The stewardess approaches with the food cart and asks, do you want the chicken or a platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it and the undecided voter asks "How's the chicken cooked?" Funny, but sad too. We need to get into a happy place and Tuesday means the difference of an over crowded dangerous highway of crazy drivers or a long stretch of calm road ahead. Please, give us the calm road.

Back from a week at the Cape - beaches, Oysterfest and a memorial for a schooltime friend. Something for everyone there. I spoke a few words at Jackie's memorial, about our long time friendship. After the speakers, there was food, snack food and a small boat decoration filled with raw oysters. Her younger sister Sandy told me how she was so angry when Jackie died too early, Sandy thought they would have so many more years to be together. A few days before I had been to a funeral for a friend in Tivoli, who died at 69. The pastor there also kept saying, too young, she died too young. Made me think of Maria at 45 but then I guess they always say too young. Not my Uncle Ed Murphy, he was 96. There they said, "Doesn't he look good?" and he did. I went to Oma's 100 birthday, but was away for her funeral, but they probably didn't say she died too young either.

Anyway, something happened to me at the Cape, something broke free and I can once again do embrodery. I haven't been able to do that since Maria died. Instead I replaced it with Sudoku, the numbers game, placing numbers 1 through 9 in blocks, filling books and books of Sudoku. I even did the ones in the newspaper each day and the one in the AARP magazine, any Sudoku I could get my hands on. I realized in Cape Cod that was because when I embroider, I think. When I do Sudoku, I have to concentrate on the numbers, nothing else, no thinking. I had my bag of assorted projects to embroider and I picked up an apron I had started before Christmas. The needle went in and out and the brain started to wander. But my thoughts weren't scarey thoughts, they weren't awful thoughts, they were just thoughts and the needle kept going until I ran out of thread and then I picked another color and it was like I had never stopped for seven months. One small step.....

I've changed in many ways, I know it. Not long ago Caleb Potter's mother wrote in her blog that Caleb had asked her, "Where's my real Mom?" She was upset and hurt, but Laura wrote to her blog, saying something like "since my sister died, I lost my real mother, the one I had before" and I know what she meant. Tragedy changes you. I told Timmy the above, and he simply said, "I lost my old girlfriend too". I know I am less tolerant, less patient. At the Cape we were in line outside waiting to eat at Moby Dick's the last night of the season it was to be open. A big van drove up and parked next to the line of waiting customers with a bumper sticker NOBAMA. "Where did you get that sticker?" asked the man in front of us."I want to get one". The people behind us piped in, "We want to get one to," That's it, I told Timmy. Let's go. I'm not eating with people that think like that and we left, with the hostess saying, "Won't you reconsider?" I wanted to yell, "You assholes want McCain. Stand in line then, like sheep, waiting to go into a restaurant" , but Timmy (who is never the conservative) said to me, "I wouldn't say anything to that group if I were you" and I didn't. But that's just an example. No patience. I can't even wait for the next two weeks to go by so we don't have to see and hear all the politicians pointing fingers and telling us how much money they are going to save us. Well, I may be impatient now, but I can once again do my embordery.

I heard the geese last night. It was the full harvest moon and they must have been taking advantage of the light to make a few more miles south. It was bright, almost light enough to read by the bedroom window. I love to hear the geese. When I was a kid my father would sing "My heart knows what the wild goose knows, I must go where the wild goose goes" a Frankie Laine hit about a wanderer who leaves the woman he loves for the wild life - a song my father seemed to like a lot more than Bucky did.

The geese have always been a symbol to me of the changing seasons, the onset of fall and the long winter, and in the spring, the promise of warm weather and summer. I love to hear the honks, almost like dogs barking and to search the sky looking for the tell tale V formation. Last March, probably just a week or so before Maria died, I was waiting with Solomon for his bus to come to pick him up. I heard the sound, and sure enough, there they were, coming north, a big V. I pointed them out to Solomon, "Look, Solly, the geese are flying north, they're making a big V in the sky." Then, there were more, several flocks, making the familiar noise, making the familiar formation. "A big V, and another big V", I pointed out to Solomon. His head pointed up, he said nodding, "Yes, just like Darth Vader" - he was and still is big time into Star Wars. After that we yelled "It's Darth Vader, Darth Vader is coming - more Darth Vader", with laughs of joy. After I returned home, I phoned Maria and was telling her about introducing Solomon to the migrating geese and how he related it to Darth Vader. She answered warmly, "Oh, Ma, what a wonderful memory for him." And that's what it is - a memory of all the times I've pointed out the geese - all the years and seasons past and to come.

Today I heard two sisters talking on local tv that they named their farm "Gansvoort" after the old Dutch name which literally means goose crossing. My sister Kathleen lives in Gansvoort and Gansvoort is a name associated with the Huson Valley, which is a real goose crossing, a regular route for the geese to go north and south by. But I had never heard the translation. I like it though, that's what the geese symbolize, crossing, leaving summer, going into winter, and then in reverse. Hoping to still be here to see them come back, but never knowing. I always plant spring bulbs with that same thought, "wonder if I'll be here to see them flowering" - it's a small leap of faith and hope for the future.

The news this morning was all about the anniversary of September 11th. Family members were interviewed and spoke of how that day will never be forgotten. I myself remember it well. The phone rang after 8am and my neighbor Kathy told me to put on the television, a plane had crashed into the Twin Towers. Timmy and I watched in disbelief as the other tower was hit. To get away from the television, Timmy and I decided to do what we did every Tuesday morning, walk to Tivoli and go to the Thrift Shop. A small group was waiting outside the door, whispering in shock, "a plane has crashed in the Pentagon", more planes are attacking, the country is at war". No one knew what to believe and then I saw Maria drive up with Regina in the car. She, too, had felt the need to do a usual, normal activity. I don't even remember going into the shop, but Margaret who lives next door, called down to us to come to her apartment. Timmy said he would walk home, and Maria, Regina and I went upstairs. We talked nervously about the events, second guessing what was coming next, and then Margaret looked at Regina, two years old at that time, and asked "Regina, would you like to hold one of my birds?" Regina nodded yes and Margaret said, "I'll let you hold Retardo, he's very easy going" and Regina stretched out her hand and Margaret took a picture of Regina, wearing a long dress, a solemn look on her young face, with that bird held so gingerly on her finger, with the tv in the background showing the smoking twin towers. Wow! Talk about capturing so much with one picture. Seven years later, the family members still feel the grief, the loss and watching them being interviewed on TV this morning, I said in my head (sometimes I do say these things out loud too), "Yes, I understand. I grieve with you at your lose." That's what grief does to you...it humbles you, it humanizes you. It gives you an understanding of the "human condition" that you can only get when you go through it yourself. Seven years have passed, and I wonder what we learned as a people, meaning the whole country, from this event. I look at the polls with Palin sweeping McCain ahead and I shake my head. Bush used this event to go to war, thousands have died, and we have a chance to elect someone who can bring the soldiers home, help our country get back on its feet, make us feel proud again as Americans, and we would rather have a gun toting, moose killing, pit bull (lipstick wearing) hockey mom leading the way. God Help Us.

Monday morning Timmy and I were cleaning up the Bird's Nest after guests for the long weekend. He was reading from our guest book, but was having a hard time deciphering the handwriting of our latest guest. He does this to me all the time. He will pick up my grocery list and say "brood" for bread or "malt" for milk. He has that perfect handwriting of an artist and no patience for my scribbling. Well, even I couldn't read what the "pleasing sounds of birds and ????" were and suddenly it brought me back to last Christmas in Ria's car heading home from our annual Christmas trek to Beacon. Regina was in the back seat and we were headed a few miles towards home when Regina remembered she hadn't eaten all day..playing with her cousin Katie had made her forget lunch. So she started in the whining about Burger King as we drove through Poughkeepsie. "We''ll stop in Hyde Park," Maria told her, "there's a Burger King there". "Ria," I whispered, "I think that's a MacDonald's". The kid heard me and yelled "I hate MacDonald's-I want Burger King. They have the best fries." "There's one in Hyde Park", screamed Ria back, "I'm pretty sure anyway," she added. But when we got to Hyde Park, there it was, a MacDonald's. Regina had a fit...."you told me it was Burger King,,I hate MacDonald's". "Well," said Ria patiently and firmly, "It's MacDonald's or nothing til we get home." Regina grunted and we turned in and got in line behind several cars for the drive-in. Maria started to giggle and turned to me. "Laura gave me the greatest tape for Christmas, Ma. It's Dane Cook (I had never heard of him) and he's talking about working at Burger King. He was 17 and his brother was manager and got him a job there....but he was embarrassed to be working at Burger King, so he called it the BK Lounge and said he was a bouncer for the BK Lounge. But, Ma, the funiest part was his brother always made him work at the drive thru...which he hated. People yelled at him, I said large fries, MF'er and screamed into the mike. But worse, he said, were the people who whispered, and he goes, extra cheese, extra pickles, all in whispers. He said he thought they were talking dirty to him....like chicken tenders and put extra pussy sauce on the meat. Well, Ria and I got laughing so hard that by the time we got to the window, Ria could hardly put in the order, but she spoke loudly and clearly giving Regina's order. And the kid got her fries and stopped whining and Ria and I laughed the rest of the way home....It was the unreadable guest book that brought that back to me and it gave me a chuckle. I turned to Timmy, and pretended to read from the book, "Thanks for the worst stay of my life...the f... birds woke me up early after the shitty refrigerator ran all night." I think that's what my life is going to be from now on, little snippets of shared times with Maria. Thanks Dane Cook for making me and Maria laugh.

Well, we went to the Rhinebeck Fair, the birds and the beasts were there. The big baboon by the light of the moon was combing his long black hair. The monkey he got drunk, he sat on the elephant's trunk. The elephant sneezed, and fell on his knees and that was the end of the monk...that was the end of the monk. The Rhinebeck Fair has been a part of our lives for the almost 40 years we have lived here. Each year the kids would get a job there and earn their money for back to school clothes. Paul went a few days before the fair opened and he and his friends had the job of assembling the rides. (That's enough to keep me off the ferris wheel.) Maria worked the lemonade stand, in fact that is how she met Kevin. I guess he thought she was cute, and bought a drink from here...see how things can start. She would come home the last day of the fair, with handfuls of one dollar bills, sticky from the lemonade, all bunched together. One of her favorite stories was when the young guy she was working with was cleaning up. The owner yelled to him "Watch out for the wires!" and he heard "wash the wires" and started to do so, while the carny had a fit. Sabra worked different booths, one time in a booth that you had to throw darts and break balloons. She was about 15 and my friend Chrissy and I were in that section of the fair looking for her. I grabbed Chrissy arm, stunned at what I saw, Sabra next to a carny, leaning over the booth, smoking a cigarette!! Her job next year was much better, working in the booth with costumes, where the fair goers would select a certain look and then have their picture taken dressed up. So, the fair has a lot of memories...this was the first year that we went without Maria, so that was a big difference. But it was like she was there is some ways...she had encouraged me to enter my embrodery last year, and I had entered three pieces, winning only a second prize for a pillowcase. This year I asked my sisters Barbara and Diane to loan me back the Christmas presents I had made them, aprons, and I won first prize for each of the aprons. Also, last year Maria had said to me, "Ma, you should enter your postcards...the winner wasn't half as good as yours." So this year I entered four of my Tivoli postcards, and won a blue ribbon for them. Thanks Maria. You just can't get away from that girl. Maria's clothes always had a certain very pleasant smell about them, different than most. Sabra asked Rachael what kind of detergent did your mother use and found out it was Tide, in the purple bottle, with vanilla and lavendar. Sabra started using it and I looked for it on the grocer's shelf and bought it too. So everytime I grab a shirt, or hang up clothes there is Ria's smell. The Fair, the laundry, my birthday. My birthday came and went last week. Last year Maria had a party for me at her house, a pirate party, and we all were dressed like pirates. I have the picture of us all, hanging on the wall, handy to the eye. And the thing I love most about the picture is that Ria and I are the only ones going "Arrrrrrr". That is a wonderful picture, a wonderful day, and a wonderful memory.

Gravestones, that's the latest item on my mind. Actually, it's not that new. We grew up on Falconer Street which ran both ways perpendicular to Washington Avenue. On the other end of our street was a large cemetery, one my mother often took us to on a walk. There we would search the stones for one with our name, or our day of birth, looking for a certain angel or checking out the resident's picture featured on the stone. Yesterday Sabra and I went to Maria's grave with a cardboard cutout of her proposed stone. When I write this, it seems a little bizarre, but actually it makes a lot of sense. The stone so far, will be 36" high, with 12" under the ground, 30" wide and 3" thick. So, we placed the cardboard "stone" up against the wooden cross that's there to see the height and compare it to Patty's stone which is right next to her. Then we went to the old part of the cemetery to see how it used to be done. When we first told the memorial man that we wanted an "old style stone" for Maria, he said, "It's about time to put an old looking stone up there on the hill." And, he's right. They all look about the same. When my father died, my brother looked for an appropriate stone for him. After seeing all the same stones, he asked, "Do you have anything in a sport motif?" and they found him an old book with a skier on a stone. Perfect. Now, the interesting thing is at that time, the skier stood alone in the cemetery as far as a sportsman theme. But, soon a stone with a man fishing appeared and then a golfer. Daddy was a tread setter. Maybe Maria will be one too. Recently a friend of Sabra's was on Martha's Vineyard and found John Belushi's gravestone which is an old style slate with skull and crossbones. I read that the stone is not near his body, for fear of vandals. But anyway, the old style stones are so interesting. Please look at www.capecodgravestones.com to see samples. Years back Maria, Jer and I did stone rubbings in the Wellfleet graveyard. She gave one to Sabra which is the one we selected for her stone. It can be seen on the website above..look for the name George Brown. It is an angel, young, with an hourglass on her head. I was drawing an example to show Timmy and when I drew the stone, putting the angel on the top rounded part, my angel's wings were too large, and the hourglass looked like a little hat. In fact the whole thing looked like Dumbo ready to fly. I laughed out loud, and asked "Hey, Ria how about you have Dumbo on your stone?"
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Well, it's been a while since I've written. First of all the vacation: the location was wonderful. Maria had found a cottage facing the beach and water, a beautiful spot. The weather was perfect, every day sunny and clear. The kids made crab houses, did gymnastics on the beach and got their feet cut up on the shells. Other than that, it was just too weird to be there without Maria. So, we'll go on from there. Today is Sabra's birthday and Paul follows in two days. They are 4 years apart. They were both conceived on presidential election nights....in 1964 -Johnson and Goldwater. Then in 1968 Nixon and Humphrey. In those days they banned the bars from being open during election hours and television only had a few channels that were all presidential coverage. I think in both those elections I had voted for the loser...Goldwater because I thought Johnson had something to do with Kennedy's assassination and then Humphrey because Nixon was just terrible. So, my candidates lost and I got pregnant because there was no tv and no open bars. My mother once told me that she became pregnant with me on November 21, the day that my grandfather, her father Poppy had lost the tips of his fingers in an accident at Harmon..I think a train wheel fell on his hand. I never asked her about the reason, but I have wondered. I do like it that Jeremy, Maria's son, was born on November 21st - 40 years to the day I was conceived. So we'll think today about births, not the other, but I did look up the title "Death Takes a Vacation", thinking maybe it was a mystery book I remembered my mother reading. But it came up as a movie...with this description,"The grim reaper decides to take three days off in a resort town". There, that would give you something to think about.

One week to our vacation in Cape Cod - this year I will be riding out with Kevin to a cottage Maria had booked in February. I have been thinkin a lot about last summer in Wellfeet. Last year we had decided for the first time in many years to get small, individual cottages right on the water, rather than a big house we all shared in town. I was sharing with Maria the first week, and then moving into the cottage that Sabra had rented for the second week, when Kevin would be joining Maria. Ria first suspected a problem when her lease included an item that read: "Tenant shall not cook bacon or pork products in the house or on the grill." "What the hell does that mean, Ma?" Ria questioned as she read it to me. "I guess we can't have bacon and eggs, or hotdogs or sausage and peppers", I answered and we both kind of snickered. We got to the cottage and Maria had already received several e-mails from the owner, asking her to check on and care for her "prize" flowers. They were the first things we saw as we walked on the deck, an assortment of dried out, dead flowers in the sun and plants in two inches of water on the shady side. Then we went into the cottage....amazement. Maria said, "I don't remember there being all this STUFF in the picture on the internet." Stuff was right. Every inch of available space was covered with knick knacks, trays, tacky vacation type souvenirs, the fireplace was filled with wood and there was wood piled high near by even though it was 80 degrees outside. The kitchen had no counter space that wasn't covered with crock pots, filled with spoons, pencils, everything imaginable. Utensils hung from hooks all over the kitchen walls as did pots and pans and barbeque items. "Where's the refrigerator?" I asked Maria as we stood in shock. "Here it is, Ma, here in the hall." Well, we unpacked the car - the kids ran to the beach only steps away, and we thought, "this isn't too bad, it IS right on the water." After a beer, a look at the beach, the realization that we were on vacation in the most beautiful place in the world, and we started to see things in a better way. "Look at this lamp, Maria" I said holding up a three foot white plastic duck that was the lamp in my bedroom. "That's nothing, Ma" Ria came out of her bedroom holding a large light in the shape of an electric bulb. "Who the hell would buy this shit?" we asked each other, over and over. "Looks like someone went nuts in the dollar store," commented Maria and it did. The living room did NOT have a couch, instead it had a wooden Adirondeck type outdoor oversized chair. Maria started her magic. She got two quilts and covered the "couch". There, that's better. Things began to come off the wall, as Maria shoved them into the closet. The wood was all taken out of the house, and put in an empty firebox on the deck. There, that's better. And it got better and better in the days that followed as slowly we shoved things under the beds or added them to the dumpster in the yard. The flowers even looked better as Maria arranged them, watering the dried out ones and caring for the drowned ones. The best night was one when Maria got acting up....came out of the bedroom with the electric light bulb, turned it on and said to Tony, "Hey, Tony, I got an idea!" "Look at me, I'm Uncle Festus!" And, the vacation that started out so thinly, got better and better. "Does everybody want bacon?" Ria asked, pulling out a large frying pan. "We sure do" and the bacon flowed. Maria could make anyplace a home, anyplace welcoming and full of life and laughs. This year will be different, but I can't imagine we won't be laughing at memories of the past and making a few of our own.

Maria's birthday fell on Father's Day this year. It also did on her first birthday, as I recall. It seems the holidays have followed Maria, she died on St. Patrick's Day, buried the day before Easter, then we had Mother's Day and now finally her birthday. I think we're done for a while..phew. We, as a family, have gotten together on each of the above days. Family...Sabra made a video for us at Christmas "My Crazy Family" and it started with a quote by Anthony Brandt: "Other things may change us but we start and end with the family". Just think about that for a minute...start and end with the family. I started with Bucky and Gob- my father. My father was and still is a hero to me. He could sing like Bing Crosby, we could whistle (hardly anybody whistles anymore), he could do a perfect swan dive, which he always preceded with the sign of the cross, he could ski with a grace and movement that was beautiful to watch, he could fish and clean the fish and even eat the fish after one of Bucky's failure in the kitchen. He helped us with our math, could spell any word you gave him and knew carpentry. But his greatest skill, his legacy, was his photography. He could capture the faces of children better than any other photographer I have ever known. His pictures fill our albums, boxes and boxes of pictures that document all the events in our lives. Everywhere he went, he had his camera with him. I remember at his wake, my brother Bob suggested that we put a camera in his hands, to make him look more normal. That was my father - that was my family. I ran across a quote that "family faces are magic mirrors. Looking at people who belong to us, we see the past, present and future" (Gail Lumet Buckly) Boy, I believe that. I look in the mirror and I see my mother looking back. I look at Paul's boy Ian and I see a picture of my father at that age. Henry reminds me of Sabra and Rachael looks so much like Maria did at that age. Family. Erma Bombeck said "The family. We were a strange little band of characters,.....loving, laughing, defending and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us." That common thread. What is it? Could it be love?

Slowly, slowly life is coming back to normal. But there are so many unexplainable happenings which of course we all attribute to Maria. Laura went to see a psychic who told her that Maria would come to me in flowers in strange places. First of all soon after her death I saw an early violet growing out of the gravel in the driveway. Then my Christmas cactus began to bloom again (it still has blooms). A heavy late frost killed all the wisteria buds on the Bird's Nest deck, but the wisteria that had climbed the nearby maples survived, and wisteria filled the trees. Now a clematis is blooming high in the apple tree, one plant with two completely different flowers. The day that Maria died, as we were all waiting in our cars in her driveway, a piliated woodpecker (the big bright red headed one - like Woody Woodpecker) casually flew from tree to tree right near the driveway. They are usually shy and not often seen. Then as Sabra drove us to Rachael's graduation, a piliated woodpecker landed next to the road, just as we drove by. Now, I have a piliated woodpecker smashing up an old stump in the back yard. Yesterday, I got within a few feet of him. He was throwing dirt and sawdust all over and I laughed out loud at his antics. Laura was also told that sometimes unusually large "critters" are seen after a death. Hers was a giant spider "big as a mouse, Ma" and when Sabra was at the grave a robin had a worm so large, that Sabra had to go and check to see what it was. Also, electronics have been affected, especially with Sabra...computers, her printer, her telephones and even her dining room light. My sister Maureen has a stuffed toy dog that says "I love you" and it began repeating the phrase (with no one turning it on) when I phoned her a few weeks back. She said it hasn't done it since. Today, I can't open my e-mail....and I just told Maria to go back to flowers for me - I want to read my mail.

Yesterday was hot. Driving in the car, I suddenly realized it was almost summer. What happened to Spring? I'm not stuck in Holy Week anymore, now I don't seem to know where I am or what day it is. I know it's almost the end of May because I have to get my car inspected and the "service engine soon" light is on, and they will not inspect it with that little glitch. I've been praying that it would go out - that worked last year, but nothing so far. What day is it? is harder than the name of the current month. My Uncle Joe, in his late 80's, goes to Castle Point for check-ups. The sanity test they give him is (1) What day is it? (2) What month is it? (3) What year is it? and (4) Who is the President? He passes each time, giving the right answers to the first three and to the fourth, he responds "that asshole" and they let that slide. Today is Wednesday, May 28, 2008 and it is the birthday of Rachael, who is 22 today. I write the birthdays on the calendar. It is my little ritual on New Year's Eve to get the new calendar and the old calendar and transport the names and birthdays to the new year. Each year is different, new babies, new weddings (I like to remember the anniversaries as well) and sometimes losses. I enjoy sending cards. When I was a kid, my father's Aunt Sadie would send a birthday card to each niece and nephew and inside the card would be a dime. Somehow that made a lasting impression on me and I am almost obsessive about getting cards out. I wonder how Aunt Sadie remembered all those names and dates and what had started down that road. And I wonder how crowded my calendar will be in the coming years. But lately I don't ponder on what day of the week is it. Instead I get these memories of things in the past that stick in my head. Today it is that cans use to come with a key to be used for their opening. Coffee had a key that you unsnapped from the top of the container and fitted carefully into the tab and slowly, slowly and carefully wound the key around the top until it came back to the start and the lid was released. Sardines had this key as well and I'm trying to think if anything else had that magic key to open it. To get the date right, all I have to do is point the mouse at the bottom of this screen. What foods used to open with a key is a little harder to find.

In Sunday's New York Times there was an obituary that ended with the words: "He wanted to be remembered by asking that you read anything written by Aldous Huxley". This gave me a lot to think about. What if the person had been a joker and wrote "anything written by James Joyce". I don't know about you, but I have tried time after time to read Joyce and I can't do it. I've never read "Brave New World" either, but I think I will look for a copy and see if it is readable. Myself, I would say read "anything written by Anne Morrow Lindberg". She is my favorite author and I have every book she had ever written. Some of my favorite quotes from her are as follows:

"Don't wish me happiness, I don't expect to be happy, it's gotten beyond that somehow.
Wish me courage and strength and a sense of humor. I will need them all."

"There are no happy days, just happy moments."

"Grief can't be shared. Everyone carries it alone. His own burden in his own way."

Now you may think those quotes are gloomy, even downers, but I see her common sense and realistic view of life coming through them. Who, without drugs, has ever been happy every minute of an entire day? Even with help, no one can be happy all the time. After Maria died, I wondered if I would ever be happy again, really happy. Then I thought of the movie "It's a Mad, Mad World" and the final scene when everything has gone wrong with their quest for the money, the men are all in traction in hospital beds, and Spencer Tracy says he'll never laugh again. Then in storms Ethel Merman and slips on a banana peel and they all start laughing, laughing so hard they can't stop. I catch myself laughing now and then, sometimes at my grandchildren and sometimes at things I am remembering. Today on television they were talking about cruises and I remembered a cruise Timmy and I took. It was the Captain's party and everyone was dressed up and a photographer was taking pictures as you entered the ball room. You had to wait in line for the photo shoot and finally Timmy and I had our turn. We stood stiffly in front of the camera and the photographer, unhappy with our pose, directed Timmy in a beautiful poetic Jamaican accent "to put your hand on the lady" . Timmy, always the comic, grabbed for my tits and the photographer said excitedly "No, No, not there!" Well, almost twenty years later that memory came back to me and I laughed. I don't think you can stop laughter.

Maria loved to laugh. She would probably have advised "read anything by David Sedaris" her favorite author. His Halloween story of the neighbors trick or treating or his Dutch version of Christmas Eve would make anyone laugh. Maybe after I read Huxley, I will look for Sedaris.

Happy Mother's Day Bucky - a salute to my Mother. I remember my childhood very vividly mostly because of Bucky. I didn't know it then, but Bucky was different. She would let my sister Barbara and I put on iceskates and "skate" on the living room rug. She would put on a Danube Waltz record and we were Sonya Hennie skating in circles, doing dips to the music. One snowy day I was in the house sick, complaining that I was missing all the fun of playing in the snow. Bucky opened the kitchen widow (we lived upstairs over my grandmother), scooped up a bowlful of snow and put it on the kitchen table. She pulled out cookie cutters, little bowls, spoons and I got to play in the snow. I loved the Curious George book and we took it repeatedly out of the library, until the librarian told us this was the last time, other people had to have a chance to take out this book. Bucky muttered, but had a plan and she took the book home and pulled out her typewriter and copied the entire book. We didn't need to borrow the book, she would read from those pages and it was as good as the book to me. I had a small painted turtle from the circus and he was always escaping from his bowl. Bucky had a solution, and tied a piece of thread still attached to the spool to the turtle. Now, she said, all we have to do is follow the thread and we can find him anywhere he goes. Unfortunately, he went under the rug and somebody stepped on him. The turtle survived, but he had blood red eyes for quite a while. Bucky grew morning glories inside the living room windows. She put up strings and the flowers climbed the window, amazing to me. Bucky could knit and crochet. She put crochet trim around handkerchiefs, and made rag rugs, using a giant wooden crochet hook. She let me make the strips for the rug, cutting up strips from old clothes and I would sew up one side, using her pedal sewing machine. For our birthday parties, and we each had one every year, she would take tissue paper, a glass ash tray, and folded the paper in a certain way until it made a perfect candy holder, which she would fill with colored mints. When my father would bring home a "It's a boy" cigar from work, she would light it up and let us all take a puff. We would all laugh, puffing away, handing the cigar from kid to kid...there were finally six of us. But the best, the very best, were her stories. She had tragedies, comedies, histories, you name it - stories about everything. And it didn't matter if we heard it before, in fact it enhanced it...we knew what was coming. Bucky had six kids but she knew how to treat herself good, with reading, with playing solitaire in the morning until she won a game, with sunning in the back yard. She was dramatic, Daddy would call her Sarah Bernhardt, and shocking...at Christmas she would put on her bathing suit and sit in front of the Christmas tree and Daddy would grab his camera and get a picture of this. Even her name, all my friends call their mothers, Mommy, Mom or Ma, I was the only one who had a different name for my mother. God Bless you Bucky, I love you with all my heart , this Mother's Day more than ever.

Seven weeks today and Maria is still in the front seat of my brain. You, me, any of us that knew Maria knows what I mean. For example, Henry pulled out a toy box today and there was one of those little white bears that had been a part of my Christmas, was it four years ago? Maria and Helene had gone to a Museum and had run into "Fluxus" and then Maria had developed the idea of a fluxus Christmas gift exchange. We met at her house in Germantown and all drew names, I think it might have been after Thanksgiving dinner. I got Paul and Helene and Maria got Timmy and me. Well on Christmas I got a note with a white bear attached, with the only Fluxus instructions was that there were five more bears hidden around Tivoli. Now this bear is only about 2-3 inches long and Tivoli is an area of one square mile. Well, we found one in a bush down at the river, a regular stop on our Sunday walk. Weeks later another one was found on Sengstack Lane, tied to a pussy willow bush. The third one was hard and Maria gave us a hint that it was close to home and Timmy found it in one of the maple trees in our yard. Weeks went by and another bear was found...this one might have been by the water tower - I've forgotten exactly where it was. Now it was into March and there was still one bear at loose in Tivoli. "Give me a hint", I begged Maria and she said it's hidden in a place you like to go to. I looked at her and asked, "The Black Swan?" and that smile gave her away. That night Margaret and I went to the Black Swan, a local Irish bar that used to serve great fish and chips. Margaret and I bent down, looking under the tables and chairs, searching behind the pictures, trying not to look too conspicuous. Finally, the bartender asked us what we were doing and I said, "Have you seen a little white bear around here?" He wasn't even surprised, just opened the cash register and reached in and pulled out the bear. "It's been here for months. I wondered who put it there." Margaret and I had big, black wonderful Guinnesses to celebrate and I called Maria when I got home and told her all the bears were back together. Now, how can you ever forget a girl like Maria?

My life the last five weeks since Maria's death reminds me of the movie "Groundhog Day" - in which Bill Murray is stuck in that day, waking up each morning to the same day. However, I'm not stuck in a day, I'm stuck in Holy Week. Palm Sunday, Maria brings over St. Patty Day cupcakes, sits on the couch laughing with Solomon about fart jokes. Monday in Holy Week, the phone call, the police car in Maria's driveway, waiting for the Medical examiner, the yellow room. Tuesday in Holy Week, the funeral plans, the coffin room, all the details. Wednesday in Holy Week, the day off, obituary in the paper, everyone over looking through albums picking out pictures for the photo boards, Maureen arrives from Bellingham, we take a breath for what's ahead. Holy Thursday, the viewing, 93 year old Mrs. Izzo waiting to see Maria ("I would have taken a bus to see Maria"),the long hours, the breakdown chairs, the tears, the hugs. Good Friday, a repeat of Holy Thursday, pall bearers are chosen, the packed room, more tears, more hugs. Holy Saturday, the last moments in the funeral home, Jodi takes a picture of the sisters, Rachael cuts her hair, the church, the priest is perfect, the speakers are wonderful, Sabra causes the church to roar with laughter.."Maria loved Martha", the cemetery, the bagpiper, people stay and stay, unwilling to leave. Then, instead of heading to Easter, I swing right back into Palm Sunday and the weeks go by, five of them now, but today is still Thursday and I'm back in the funeral home. Maybe you have to do this, get stuck in your sorrow, go over and over it, until you get it out of your system. When the movie "Groundhog Day" came out, people laughed, enjoyed the humor, but there was more to it than that. The movie has grown to become what the National Film Registry calls "culturally historical" and "aesthetically significant". Religious students watch the movie as part of their class. Bill Murray learns from the days' repetition and I have to believe that, like Bill Murray, I will learn from being stuck in Holy Week - what I'll learn, I'm not sure, but I think my mind has a purpose. So I head into Good Friday tomorrow, but someday, someday, it will just be Friday.

There was a small article in the paper the other day stuck way in the back pages, but it caught my eye. "Escalator injuries increase over 10% in the last ten years". This got my attention because my mother, Bucky, always warned us of the danger of escalators. The article went on to say that the increasing injuries were thought to be related to our aging population - in other words its the old people who are getting caught or tumbling down the moving stairs. Bucky warned us of escaltors, but also anything that moved...cars were very dangerous. Before crossing the street, look both ways, then look again. Sometimes we would stand on the sidewalk looking this way, then that way for several minutes before we deemed it safe to cross. Riding in cars was even more dangerous. "Don't stick your hand out the window, I know a woman whose boy lost his arm doing that." God help those people who stuck their heads out the window. Once when I was working at IBM, I heard the man in the next office laughing out loud. Curious, I went in to see what he was laughing about and he pointed to the headline on his Enquirer newspaper: "Man gets first successful head transplant". I laughed, but I was reminded of my mother's warning and wondered if that's how he lost his first head - leaning out of the car window. Trains, even though they were on a track, were even more dangerous because of their size and speed. Today when I go to the river and have to cross the tracks, again I look both ways several times, and then hurry as fast as I can go, being careful not to catch my foot in the track. Airplanes can fall out of the sky and hit you. Bucky told us about the plane that crashed in Mt. Beacon on a foggy night. "Your father went up to see the wreckage and found the pilot's brains smeared all over the rocks." You can be sure I look up if I hear a plane that sounds like it might be coming down.

Bucky's warnings proved true when my nephew Jess, Maureen's boy, got caught in an escalator. Maureen or Rob might be able to give the details, but as I remember his underwear got caught around his neck and was choking him. I think they had to rip his clothes off to free him.

I wondered what kind of injuries these elderly people were getting and then I thought, I bet it's not the older people, I bet it's the kids. Nobody watches their kids anymore. I've seen them on the escalators, they run on the steps, use them like a carnival ride. I imagine parents tell their kids to go play on the escalator while they wait for our plane. There I feel better, but I know the next time I have to use an escalator I'll jump on the top stair, heart thumping, hang on the railing, and wait anxiously for that bottom step to make my leaping exit.

Well, I broke down and took reservations for the Bird's Nest starting next week. My mentor Phyllis Gardner told me "never take walk-ins - get reservations and deposits way in advance." I know why she said this. I've had people call from a bar in Tivoli..."Hi, we're here at the Stoney Creek and my girlfriend and I are pretty drunk. We're wondering if you have a room for the night?" That is when you say, "Sorry, we are booked." It's not always a problem with over indulgence. Last summer I had a call, "Hey, were up here in Tivoli, and we got your number. My friend and I have biked up from the city. We really need a place to stay." I responded that I just had people and didn't have a chance to clean or make the beds. He hung up. The phone rang two minutes later, "Hey, listen, we don't need the beds made. We're covered in sweat and we just need a place to wash up and get some shut eye." When they don't even want the beds made, you know that's trouble. I had a man leave a message on my machine last week. He wanted two weekends in August, during the Bard Music Festival, a time when everything fills up quickly and some places even double their rates. His message: "I'll even sleep on the floor, anything at all". Then he must have realized other needs, because he added, "And a washroom - I'll need a washroom." Now, that is desperate. And what the hell is a washroom? It sounds like a laundry room to me. I've told people that I am booked, and they will ask "Can we bring a tent and camp in the yard?" They didn't even ask about the washroom. Bringing their own I guess. I did have people come early once. They were scheduled for Thursday, and I was up on the computer the day before, when I hear a voice under the window: "YooHoo, anyone home?" I stuck my head out the window, two people were standing there, smiling up at me. "Hi, we're the Jones, we're here a day early, but can we get in?" Dear sweet Jesus, I thought. Then said, come back in half an hour and I will be ready. I thought of Phyllis and said, "Well, there not really walk-ins...there just "early" guests.

Last year in one of my classes at Bard the instructor discussed the impact we make on the environment, garbage per person, use of fuel, etc. Then she told us about a man in New York City who was attempting to make no or little impact on the environment for one year. He had no refrigerator, bought the food daily and ate it raw, used no paper or plastic (even toilet paper), rode a bike to work, etc. For a whole year! He will probaby write a book about it and make a fortune but it made me remember when Tivoli had the 19th Century Man. It was in the early 70's when a Bard drop out took residence in Tivoli and opened the Tivoli Player Piano Shop. At the age of 23 he had forsaken the modern conveniences to live a simpler life. He certainly looked the part. He wore his hair parted carefully in the middle topped with a straw hat. His suit was vintage and he wore spats. A pince-nex with a black ribbon completed the outfit. He was quoted as using such language as "Balderdash" or "Oh, perdition", but I can't recall that. Laurence G. Broadmoore was his name and his shop was the small building next to the Madalin Hotel. He explained his actions: since the age of 13 he had chosen another century because that "was the last time in which pride in craftmanship, beauty and intellectual honesty were valued". His craft was restoring century old player piano which he did for about $1500 per piano, taking as long as a month for each job. He did guarantee his work for 10 years. At that time, Tivoli had not yet started to regain its population, there were about 800 villagers. He attracted enough attention to appear in an article in Time Magazine which said, "he may be the best adjusted citizen of Tivoli" - which makes one wonder what the rest of us looked like. Anyway, out of curiousity I goggled his name and found he had applied for a patent in 2/13/01 for a method for coupling electronically stored music but I wonder if he is still dressing the part and avoiding this century. It almost seems so if you can't find him on the internet. Last year during a slide show on Tivoli given by our now Mayor, Tom Cordier, a picture of Laurence in full costume appeared. Tom said, "I think this is a picture of one of our old time residents, is that right Linda?" he turned to me. "No," I responded "That was the eccentric Bard student that lived here for a while restoring pianos." The audience looked at Tom, then me, and I don't think they believed either of us.

This morning I laid on my couch, drinking a cup of coffee, admiring the sun lighting up the trees and watched the birds. There were blue jays, red-winged blackbirds (a sign of spring), red bellied woodpecker, juncos (a sign that winter is still here), doves and chickadees. And I thought a week ago we buried Maria, two weeks ago she was here in this living room alive and well. But I'm not ready to write about Maria - when I do I want to write with joy not sorrow. So today I am going to write about St. Sylivia's school and convent. Why? Because I collect postcards of Tivoli and this is one postcard that I have coveted for years, seeing it only once on E-Bay and I lost the bid. The school was a wood framed two story house that lay east of the church next to the Demboski house. It was used as the school and convent from 1888 to 1962. (We moved to Tivoli in 1967.)

I found the following in a booklet on the 75th anniversary of St. Sylvia's church. Mrs. Redmond of Tivoli wanted to have a school in Tivoli "for the moral training of the children".

"The superiors told Mrs. Redmond if she wished to have the Sisters (for teachers) she would have to build a convent. Mrs. Redmond made a promise, she would build a convent if the Lord would bless her with a child. The promise was fulfilled. The first child, Johnston, was born on the feast of St. Vincent, July 19, 1988. On August, Achbishop Corrigan stopped over at Tivoli to baptize the baby and bless the convent which was opened on August 15, 1888. "

So the convent was there before the church was built in 1903. I remember the convent, it was used by the Girl Scouts for meetings in the 70's, probably torn down about 1975. At that time Father Geissler was the pastor. Father Geissler and I had a past together, he was from Beacon and had married me as well as my sister Maureen. (Neither marriage worked which might just be a coincidence.) Anyway, I typed for Father Geissler, typing for Jesus, I called it, the Sunday bulletin that was passed out. The convent was almost bare of furniture, as I recall, but there were two or maybe even three pianos still there. When I learned the building was to be razed, I asked Father Geissler if I could buy one of the pianos. He responded that I could have one, but not to tell anybody since Tivoli was a small town, and to make a donation in the collection box. Well, we didn't exactly sneak the piano out of the convent, my husband and friend Mike Stofa put it in the truck one night, Mike in the back with the piano, playing it down Broadway on the drive to our house. It stood in the living room, massive in the small house, and Sabra took lessons for some years. I remember Laura making her tap dance and play the piano at the same time and I remember when Maria broke her collar bone, she lay on the floor, her pillow under the piano....I think there was a Blum boy with her on the floor. Anyway, if anyone ever sees a postcard of the St. Sylvia school and convent, please get it...I'll pay anything for it. Well, almost.

I know I said I would write about running a B&B and living in Tivoli, but I just have to say a few words about Spitzer. First of all, What was he thinking? My sister Maureen used to take the train into Boston everyday and one day the woman sitting next to her, turned to her and asked, "What do you think I should do - kill myself or go to work?" Maureen quickly responded, "Oh, I think you should go to work". Now if Spitzer had asked the cleaning woman or the elevator man, "What do you think I should do - buy my wife a valentine card or haul my horney ass to Washington to pay $5000 for a prostitute?" I'm sure either one w0uld have said, "Oh Governor, go buy your wife a valentine." And what's with his wife standing by his side, looking like the house just burned down, the dog got run over and their three daughters were on drugs, in jail and knocked up. Where is her spirit - her pride? When I worked in IBM, one of the women in my department was a pretty, feisty black woman named Janet. Janet told me about having her first son, how he was a big baby and she had such a time pushing him out. When he was born, she said, "That's not my baby - he's white" and the nurse explained to her that black babies are born white and then turn black. (Now this I never knew and I have never heard before or since.) Anyway, she was laying in her room, the baby in the bassinet next to her, turning black, when a woman came into the room and announced that she and Janet's husband were in love and that he was going to leave Janet and live with her. Janet pulled herself up in the bed, and said, pointing to the baby, "Well, you can take his big fat kid with you too, you can have them both." Of course, the woman didn't want the kid, and when she heard Janet didn't want her husband, he didn't sound so good either, so she left. Later, when her husband showed up, she reamed him out good, and some of the nurses joined in to tell him what an airhole he had been. Now that's the type of reaction I wanted from Mrs. Spitzer...if she had just turned to him and said "What were you thinking?" and jabbed him in that big stupid looking jaw, I think the whole country, no, the whole world, men and women alike, would say, "Way to go, girl". Well. I'm glad to get that off my chest.

Well, we're back from Florida, for Laura's wedding last Friday, Leap Year Day or as I remember from Lil Abner, Sadie Hawkins Day. The wedding was at 9, very nice, good group of family and friends, back to their place for snacks and Maria's wedding cake, that had two alligators, one with a veil, one with a top hat on it along with a colorful array of candy fruit. Suitable for the couple bound for Florida. At 10:45 they left to catch the train, and by 11:01 I think I was starting to get the flu that Atticus had had all week and that Laura and Michael were going to remember their honeymoon by for at least the first 10 years of marriage. Yes, I've been down with the flu, complete with fever, aches, coughs, etc. Today I'm starting to think I might recover. So I've been on the couch, watching tv and filling a grocery bag with tissues and rubbing Vicks on my chest every few hours. TV during the day is a lot of news, and they put the darnest things on just to keep it going, "Irish bar bans "Danny Boy" for the month of March," "Men who help with the chores get more sex" and "14 year old boy declares California city cuss free for a week". Now that last one got to me. Cussing, especially, when you are sick, is really good for you and probably helps the healing process. I guess today, though, cussing to a 14 year old is mostly the f-word, said in a variety of new ways, such as WTF. My mother swore slightly, but colorfully. Sometimes she would follow it with "excuse my French" which I thought was wonderful. Who would think shit was a French word? My Uncle Ed went to war in 1943, he was only 18 and I was not even one. Bucky (my mother) wrote to both of her brothers at least once a day, often using her Underwood Typewriter and filling both sides of the paper. I have these letters and they are delightful. She often used the s-word and it often had something to do with me. "I have to change the kid's shitty diaper", "I found a feather in the kid's shit today". She probably learned this from my grandmother who was also known to use that word and others as well. One Christmas Eve she went shopping for the tree, sure she would get a bargain so close to Christmas. When the man wouldn't lower the price, they argued back and forth, until Grandma challenged him"Do you know what you can do with these trees after tomorrow? He glared at her and she answered her own question.."Wipe your ass with them!" Last night we were watching PBS, a special on Pete Seeger. Arlo Guthrie was talking about the Clearwater and how Pete knew that people would come to the river to see a sloop once again on the Hudson and realise the toll of pollution. Arlo said the people would see the boat and say, "Oh what a lovely boat. Oh, there's SHIT in the river!". Of course they bleeped out the word, but I laughed so hard I got coughing. Cussing can be creative, in how you arrange the words, select the words, use the words. Years ago we had a friend Mike Stofa who told us his mother always called him Peckerhead, especially when she was upset with him. Once on a school picnic, his mother was chaperone, and things were going well until Mike and some boys climbed a tree. The teacher called their names several times, but no one heard her and then Mike heard "PECKERHEAD" and everyone, teachers, chaperones, all the students were completely silent. His mother just said, sometimes I forget and call him the family name, but he never lived that down. So, cussing has a place in society, whenever I see left over Christmas Trees, or pumpkins after Halloween, I remember Grandma's prediction. My mother often referred to children, her own grandchildren as well, as little shits. I find myself saying, "get the cloth, the little shit spilled the drink" and it feels right and it sounds right. Glad to be back in shitty New York with the f... flu.

The morning news just reported today as the coldest morning of the year. February is like that, cold and dismal. "Death Month" my mother called it, because both her parents died in February, Poppy on Ash Wednesday (which we just had last week) and Grandma on Leap Year Day February 29. Timmy and I are off to Florida Thursday, Valentine's Day, so I can almost take this brutal weather. It did remind me of one of our winter Bus Entertainment skits. Bus Entertainment started and ended in school year 2001-2002. My granddaughter Atticus had started kindergarten and I would wave to her as the bus went by. Then we had 9/11 and the faces in the bus reflected the fears and uncertainties we all felt. I thought how hard it must be for the kids to understand this event, so I didn't just wave my hand, I waved a flag, and got a couple of smiles. Next day I waved two flags and got a little more attention. The next day as I was waiting, Timmy came outside, brushing his teeth. The bus went by, the kids spotted Timmy brushing his teeth and he became an instant hit. I then realized that we could do more than just wave and we invented quick skits, just seconds long as the bus went by. One day I dressed in Tim's suit, and he wore one of my dresses, complete with accessories, handbag, etc. We pretended to play chess, Timmy put a ladder against the tree in the front yard and waved from there. It went on and on as we became more creative with our few seconds of entertainment. One cold day, maybe even in February, we came up with the best skit yet, or so the school bus driver told my daughter Laura later in the afternoon. Tim and I had thought of a summer scene in the snow - Kiddie pool, bathing suits, beach chairs, beach balls, etc. Laura wanted to be a part of it - she said she could put Atticus on the bus in Tivoli and get to our house before the bus came to Clay Hill Road since it had to pick up kids all over in Tivoli first. So we got out the props, put on long underwear with bathing suits on top and the beach chairs were positioned in the front lawn in the snow. Laura drove up fast and approved of the scene. I asked if Atticus had any idea of what we were doing, and Laura said that Atticus had asked why was she wearing her bathing suit and Laura had told her she had run out of clean underwear! Anyway, we heard the sound of the bus and got into position. I was on a beach chair wearing sun glasses, reading a book, and Tim was in the Kiddie pool and Laura and he were throwing a beach ball back and forth. The bus came slowly down the road, the bus driver paused for a few seconds, and the kids all stared then off they went. I often wondered what the kids told their parents that night, or what the bus driver told the other bus drivers, but we never heard. Bus entertainment ended when one kid lowered the window and yelled "Get a Life" but we were tired of show business anyway. February does that to you, wears you down. Saturday mornings I go to the thrift shop in Tivoli with Sabra. This week the usual crowd was there and one person was writing a check. What day is it? was posed and we all had different answers.."I think it's the 10th", "No, I think it's the 17th", "Tuesday was the 5th"...on and on until a calendar was produced. It's just February, the month that wears you down so one day is like the next, not even worth given a number, just get us through Death Month one more time.

I'm a birdfeeder and yesterday's ice and snow storm brought out all the hungry birds. Today I only have the black oil sunflower seed left. I was afraid to walk on the ice so I just threw the seed on the deck off the living room and this morning had a total of eight squirrels and one deer, that stuck her head through the rails to lick the seed off the deck. The bird seed attracts all types of animals - possums, skunks, squirrels, deer- and the birds attract hawks and stray cats. I have one now, if anyone out there wants him, a handsome Blue Russian male cat. Timmy says I'm getting to be a weird old lady that feeds cats and ends up with 27 of them in the house. And I myself say NO MORE CATS. Our first cat after we moved to Tivoli was Kelly, a calico cat that I drove to Wappingers Falls to adopt. In the newspaper want ads under Animals there was an ad "Free -Rescued Cat from being drowned in nearby creek. Needs a home". The untold story touched my heart and I drove 30 miles to get her. No longer a kitten she went into heat soon after (I thought she had been poisoned from the way she was acting, called the vet, who told me what was going on) and on St. Patrick's day she had three kittens. This was the beginning of a long line of cats in the house, black one, yellow ones, all colors, but I still prefer a calico cat. Aunt Lillian said the riverboat gamblers used to keep a calico cat because they brought them money, maybe that's why I have this preference. We had many cats, but only one dog, Woofus, a beagle that came from the pound. We'll never know the history that dog had, but she was as neurotic as can be, pissed everytime you pet her and ate everything in sight. One Christmas when I took the kids to Christmas Mass, we came home to bedlum...she had eaten Paul's GI Joe to a chewed up piece of plastic, in several places under the tree. Maria's new earmuffs were destroyed and various other presents were gone. Woofus had two claims to fame...one she saved the Barrett's dog when someone shot her. Woofus apparently guided Blanka back home, badly wounded. The other episode was when my husband came home from work, looked upset and said, "I just saw the kids chasing the dog, and I think the dog had your wedding dress in her mouth." Yes, I had given my wedding dress to the kids to play in and I think Woofus's action (and mine) foreboded what was to come. We had chickens, but you wouldn't put them in the category of pets...or anything you would even want to be associated with. And we had Jennifer, a birthday present for Laura's 4th birthday, a baby lamb. Lambs are cute but it doesn't take them long to become sheep, and a sheep in your yard is nothing to fancy. She ate all the forsythia bushes, all the lilacs, anything you wanted to grow, she would eat. We finally found a farmer to take her...he said she had good lines and would be good for breeding and we often would look for her or a sheep like Jennifer at the Rhinebeck Fair. Last year we had red squirrels in the walls, a family of them, mother, father and three babies. They would chase each other up and down the bittersweet that grew on the chimney, get into the house and scamper in the kitchen ceiling. We trapped one baby and Timmy took him to Germantown and released him about 7 miles from the house. But we were told they come back, you have to take them across the Hudson and leave them in Kingston. So that's where the next one went...like criminals, we drove over the bridge, driving to a quiet place, opening the car trunk and bringing out the HaveAHeart and hoping no one who lived in the neighborhood saw us. The parents were harder to catch and I finally played the song Tiquila about 20 times, all the time beating on the kitchen ceiling with a cane. That did the trick. Timmy cut all the bittersweet down and Sabra got me a BB gun for Mother's Day that year so I'm ready if they come back. Today my children all have cats, and I know their cats almost like I know my grandchildren. Sabra has four cats, Paul has only one but he's had him for years, Laura has two, one name Snickers-foockers and Maria has two, one - Drew named after Drew Barrymore and a new one Hunter. Drew, like Woofus, is neurotic and on medication but still has uncontrollable bathroom habits. Also, last Christmas she threw up in the manger right on Baby Jesus. Like I said NO MORE CATS.

This summer I joined road runner for both faster internet and cablevision. We must get over 200 channels now, but there still is nothing to watch that's worthwhile. Timmy and I got so that we could see the first two seconds of Raymond or Seinfeld and say, "this is the episode where..." like Name that Tune only there were no winnings involved. So we started to listen to tapes. I found two Harry Potter tapes in the Thrift Shop for $1 each and we were hooked. Right now we are waiting for the last Harry Potter book on tape. This one is popular and we were number 36 of people waiting for the audio book from the Tivoli Library, and last I heard we had come down to 26. In the meantime we have been listening to Garrison Keillor and his Lake Wobegon stories. Right after supper, I get settled on the couch under the afghan my mother knitted for me when I graduated college in 1985. We turn the gas stove on and I shut off the living room light. The stove throws off shadows much like a fireplace and we listen to the smooth voice of Garrison Keillor as he tells his stories of life in Minnesota. With his entertaining tales and the lights flickering we could be in a prehistoric setting, sitting in a circle with the clan leader telling us about the saber toothed tiger that got away or the people that live in the cave across the river that really aren't very nice. It's in our blood, story telling and listening, in our DNA. My mother, we called her Bucky, was a story teller. Oh, she would tell us about when Grandma and Poppy moved from the city in the 20's, they bought their house really cheap because the previous owner's daughter had killed herself by jumping into the well after being jilted. Or, the neighbor Nellie Chase, her only child had died after eating one of the first jars of processed baby food. And Nellie's husband was a gambler, and when he won he would hide the money in the stone walls that separated our house from the Chases. Grandma's sister Aunt Ana married Uncle Arnold whose mother came to live with them...a crazy little woman, who couldn't speak English and had a tendency to run away, so they locked her in the cellar, bars on the windows and everything, but she still would escape. One time after breaking out she found ripe berries, and ate so many they gave her diarrhea and when Uncle Arnold found her, she threw her poopy underwear right at his head! Oh, how we loved her stories. Horrible though they were, we grew up on them, mesmerized much the way the kids look today with their gameboys under their noses. My grandson lives next door and he often comes over for SLT - Special Linny Time. One of his favorite things to do is tell stories. We take turns, often using props from the toy box, reversing roles of listener to teller. Last week, I was doing a version of Goldilocks and he stood up and interrupted:"You've given me two MORE ideas." I enjoy this time as much as he does. During the last week as part of my usual short lived January resolutions, I have been sorting family letters...hundreds of them saved over the last 40 years. They too are stories, silent, but when I read them I can almost hear the writer's voice. My mother, always thrifty, would write down to the last piece of the paper. At the end of one of her letters she wrote: "Well, Linda, no news is good news, so they say. What the hell does that mean anyway?" My sister Maureen's letters are so funny, I laugh out loud reading some of them. We both went through divorces at just about the same time, so we often exchanged war stories of our dates and selection of men. Maureen's support group of women were having the same problems and she wrote that one woman stood up and said,"I don't know why I don't just go the local prison and tell them to send me out the worse, hardened cases, because I seem to be finding them anyway." I guess you could say that blogs are now the story tellers, instead of the flickering fire light, it's the flickering monitor as we follow the stories and lives of strangers that seem like family. People we've never met, but who reveal themselves to us as personally as any lifetime friend. And so I leave you today fellow blog readers, that's the news from Clay Hill Road, where all the women are strong, the men are good looking and the children are above average.

Does anybody remember the song, "June in January"? Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Jo Stafford all had a version of it, and as my family had albums from all these artists, I'm not sure which one I heard as a kid. But June in January has been stuck in my head, even as I wore my socks to bed last night. Growing up, my sister Barbara and I slept in an attic room - no heat - and I can remember my mother would iron the sheets before we jumped into the bed. A few years back one of our B&B guests asked me if I had a hot water bottle she could borrow. "They're so comforting", she explained but I didn't own one. Soon after I sent away for one and sure enough she was right, it is very comforting and keeps the tootsies warm for hours. Another guest once wanted the heat on in June. I turn the Emergency Switch to the furnace "off" in June. I had to do this because people were runing the air conditioner and the heat would go on. One time I heard the furnace running, the air conditioner running and they had all the windows and front door open. My face flushed, my heart beat fast and my blood pressure went to a new high and at that point I realized I just had to shut the furnace completely off. Anyway, this one time we had a couple from Texas and I must admit it was a chilly day for June, but when we brought breakfast up, he said they needed heat. "Last night my wife was so cold I had to put her in a hot tub." I got an instant visualization....she's frozen solid, he runs to her and says, hang on, I can help, fills the bathtub to the top corner with hot water, gently carries her from the bedroom to the tub where he gradually sinks her cold, frozen blue body into the tub. I still can see this. And I did relent that time and turned the heat back on. I remember another cold night in June - June 1972. It was Tivoli's Centennial. 100 years since the people of the villages of Tivoli and Madalin were united, incorporated into one village. It was a big deal for the village - three days and nights of activity, starting with a Miss Tivoli contest on Friday night at the Legion Hall. Saturday the tenth was the big day, track and drum and bugle corps competition at Memorial Park, old time movies at Legion Hall, pie baking contest and at 3 o'clock the centennial parade down Broadway. My daughters Maria and Laura marched with the scouts and Ham Fish waved to the crowd from an open car. And the festivities continued the next day with a full day of entertainment and music. Finally at 7:00pm the Hudson Valley Philharmonic played on a large stage that was brought into town. I remember the music, but most of all I remember it was cold, cold enough to see your breath and kids were wearing heavy jackets and wool hats. Another note, the three days were planned and coordinated by Bernie Tieger, a Bard College sociology teacher, now retired and running the Village Books bookstore. I can't imagine the work that must have gone into a three-day wide celebration. My hat is off to you Bernie....even though it is January and you need something on your head.

The grayness of January and the start of a new year put me in a retro mood, thinking more of the past then the year 2008. That doesn't even look like a date to me, I have been reading old letters from the 90's and dates should start with 19..... That is what I like most about Clay Hill Road, how little it has changed in 40 years. There have only been two new houses built on the street, both tucked so far in the woods, as to be almost invisible. And the Jordan-McNally house was torn down but replaced with a module home. In the 70's Mr. and Mrs. Jordan were raising their grandchildren, three boys, Joey the youngest and the twins Mike and Frank. Their house was tiny, how they all fit I don't know. The boys would play at our house a lot and were creative and good sports so my kids liked them. Mrs. Jordan was an ancient, small Irish woman with white hair in a bun. And as I once found out, we shared a birth date - August 21st. She was a true Leo, would roar for the boys and I would advise them that Grandma is calling. They would ignore me and her and after a few minutes you would see her coming down the road, waving a big stick, calling their names. As she got closer, the excuses would come: "We didn't know that was you calling. We thought it was the chickens making a noise". This would get them all laughing, and only increase her anger until they ran before her with the stick waving at their heels. Between our house and the McNally's was Harold Moore's. Harold worked for the railroad and lived with his wife Libby and son. There is a big field between our houses and Harold would plant different crops there, trying out new vegetation that never seemed to take. The year that Bobby Kennedy was shot he was growing raspberries and had time bombs set to go off and frighten the birds. Every blast made me flinch, reminding me of the dead Kennedys. Harold would pay my kids $1.00 to fill a grocery bag full of dandelion heads that he would make into dandelion wine. Libby's sister, Mrs. Lemon lived at the end of Clay Hill, right on route 9G. She took in boarders, old people who either didn't have family or just needed a place to stay. One boarder was Ralph, a giant of a man who was known throughout the Village. Every morning he would walk through the Village to the river estate where he worked, carrying a large lunch box and giving everyone that passed in a car a big wave. Each passerby received a full salute and a big false toothy smile. Ralph would occasionally come to our house, knock at the door, and when greeted would give a big hug...a real crusher. My girls and I took turns being the human sacrifice for the hug and greeting and the folksy advise -"Know how to make a turtle soup? Pick up a dead turtle from the road....." . Mrs. Smith and her daugher Margaret lived across from the Lemons, in a large older home facing 9G. Miss Smith was then the Tivoli Librarian. The Library is now Village Books, but I can still picture Margaret sitting at the Library checkout desk in the window. Years later Margaret married Art Lemon from across the street. He has passed away but Margaret is still going strong, volunteering for the FireHouse and the St. Paul's thrift shop. The next two homes were "summer homes" of the DePauls (now my daughter Sabra's home) and Mary Jonas (now the home of Irene Staffiero and Tink Miller). Tony Staffiero is living in his grandfather's house, which is now enlarged twice the size when Nick and Mrs. Fragano lived there. Nick was our "mail man" would get our mail everyday. He would drive up playing the radio and toot the horn for us to come out and get our mail. My daughter called Mrs. Fragano "the old girl" I think because she looked so childlike, always wearing a large apron over her dress and white anklets on her feet. Nick was sometimes our babysitter and taught the kids card games and how to make houses using the cards. They were the parents of Fran who lived next door. Angelo and Fran Staffiero's house now belongs to his daugher, so the three younger Staffieros now each have their home on Clay Hill. The street hasn't changed much, but many of the people have gone to another place...Mrs. Lemon, Ralph, Art Lemon, Harold and Libby Moore, the Jordans, Mrs. Rector, Jan Barrett, Fran and Angelo, Nick and Mrs. Fragano. About fifteen years ago we had a Clay Hill Road Reunion, all of the present Clay Hill residents, plus all we could find that had lived here at one time came for a picnic gathering. It was a great success, everyone brought pictures and memories of what Clay Hill Road had meant to them. This makes me wonder if maybe there is a Clay Hill Reunion going on, with all the above people telling stories and having a good old time reminiscing about the street they all lived on. The good old days. Let's hope for the best for 2008....that number still doesn't look right to me.

"There are three Tivoli's in the world - in Copenhagen, in Italy and here in New York", said Mr. McVitty, husband of Honoria Livingston, the last Livingston to live in the Clermont mansion. Mr. McVitty would sit on the bench outside the house talking to visitors, telling them stories of the house and the family. I went to work at Clermont in 1974 as a tour guide. Clermont is a state park about one mile north of Tivoli with a large home, walled gardens, rolling hills that face the river and mountains. At that time the house was being restored, hopefully to be fully open for the Bicentennial. But at first, just the main hallway was open to the public. As a tour guide, you had to be creative with just a hallway to show the guests. There were some family portraits hanging to be indentified, but the main attraction was the large Dutch door facing the river. I would fling the top open, saying "And this was the view the Livingston family had", and as they ahhed and oohhhed, I would add, "And they actually owned their view. They owned all the Catskill mountains you can see." This really got them going. After two years, most of the house was open to the public, so our tours became more complicated and we were urged to stick to the script, not to use any of Mr. McVitty's family stories. One rainy gray day, the doorbell rang, the signal for a tour. As it was my turn, I got up and answered the door. There stood two little black girls, all by themselves. I let them in thinking what a waste of my time, just two little girls, and I started with the portraits, and so and so Livingston married his cousin, so and so Livingston, and one of the little girls whispered to the other, "Oh, they had to marry their kin." Then and there I decided to give these girls the best tour I could. I pulled out every one of Mr. McVitty's stories, showed them all the things we usually never mentioned. They liked the holes in the book cases made by the family to let the cats chase the mice from gnawing on the books, they liked the bathtub I showed them, telling them the family would bring in the gold fish from the pond in the winter and keep them here in the bathtub until Spring. I showed them the sliding door to the servants' quarters in the attic, and told them how a watchman, new to the job, didn't realize it was a sliding door. When he pushed it to go upstairs on his rounds and it didn't move, he thought a burglar or a ghost was holding the door shut. Then I told them about the servants, young girls not much older than they were, how one was found dead on the grounds below the attic window. Was she pushed, did she jump, or did she accidentally fall? By the time the tour ended, their eyes were as big as saucers, and they thanked me and ran up the hill, holding hands. It was several minutes before the doorbell rang again, and I told John, "Your turn". John had a hangover and was holding his head. He moaned and went to the door. I looked out the window and was surprised to see the same two little girls, but now they had a whole group with them, maybe a church picnic, I thought. When John came back from the tour, I asked how it went. "Oh, " he said, "They asked all kinds of stupid questions about the bathroom and the servants quarters. They must have been talking to McVitty". I just nodded and smiled. Today, showing people upstairs to the B&B, I realize I again go into "Tour Mode". I sweep into the kitchen, waving at the coffee maker, "If you want to make coffee..", then throw upon the refrigerator, "the coffee, milk, half and half are in here...also drinks". I wave at the cabinets, "tea and snacks are in there. You can have anything you find." They follow me obediently into the living room, I wave at the dining room table, "We bring breakfast here to you. Fill out your menus and leave them on the downstairs table. " I point to the bedrooms, "Extra pillows and blankets are in the closets" and I motion toward the closet door in the living room wall, "And in the cubby, you will find the cushions for the chairs on the deck". Cubby, they stare at each other. Cubby, she must be speaking in a foreign language. Then with a Bette Davis wave and smile, I toss my head, and say, "See you in the morning". All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players....and one man (or woman) in his time plays many parts. Oh, and by the way, Mr. McVitty was perfectly correct. There are only three Tivolis in the world.