I've been feeling low lately, a combination of the time of year, not good results from the knee doctor and just a somethings not right feeling. I was even writing imaginary gloomy blogs about Amazing Grace and the sad sound of the geese returning. Then today, three things turned this around. First my horoscrope (don't laugh) "Just because you have a tendency toward theatrics, doesn't mean you'll sign up for misery....Go where the happy people are." Then a woman, Barbara from Georgia, a stranger to the family, wrote to teamria blog "sharing your loss and your joyful memories makes each of you stronger". And finally, the piliated woodpecker was right outside my window and hung around in the back yard for a long time. So, I'm replacing the sad sound of Amazing Grace with some of my best memories of Maria and the family.

And most of them have to do with Cape Cod. Maria was like the Tazmania Devil on the Cape, chauffeur, grocery shopper, beach packer upper, etc. She was at her best when something went wrong, like the toilet getting clogged - a big problem when there are more than a dozen people using it. Maria would get a gleam in her eye, put a big pot of water to water to boil, find the plunger and be off to rid the clog. "I learned everything about plumbing from the old man", she would say, pouring the boiling water down the toilet, plunging, more water, plunging, until you heard a victory cry "Shitter's working".

The same with setting up the umbrella. The beach winds on the Cape are often strong, sending unbrellas dangerously spinning at helpless, unsuspecting beach goers. Maria had a way with the umbrellas, they never got free when she put them in. First, she would find the right spot, not too many stones, then she would get into a deep knee bend, gripping the umbrella pole and twisting her body and the pole round and round, going deeper and deeper. Ria had beautiful legs, a strong dancer's legs, nothing weak about them, and that umbrella would be in for the whole day.

Oh, sometimes we laughed at ourselves. Once, when Rachael was about ten, Maria opened a beer (no alcohol on the beaches) and Rachael started to yell "Lifeguard, Lifeguard, my mother's drinking a beer". Ria smacked her hand over her mouth, and promised to drag her up the dune and leave her in the car if she didn't stop. One time Atticus and Regina were acting up, and we kept yelling at them, Atticus, Regina, Atticus Regina. A group nearly by (probably with alcohol) started to mimic us, but they said Sparticus, Regina Rex, Sparticus. It made us laugh too.

Just driving to the Cape in the car with Maria was an adventure. One time we stopped at MacDonald's so that Maria could nurse Regina, who was having a fit. We were sitting in the car, waiting for Regina to fill up, when an oriental woman backed her car into a parked car. Straightening the car, she ran into a car in front of her. People all came out to see the commotion and the woman started to yell at her kids in a heavy accent: "See what you make me do! You make me have accident! You make me have two accidents!" Maria and I laughed at that for the next two hours.

There were a lot of laughs the year that Regina and Ava were in the same class. Ava had moved to Red Hook, but Maria assured me that they never put two people from the same family together. That was until Ava and Regina ended up in the same class. Every day after school there was another episode and one I remember well involved Ava standing up and saying in a loud voice (and deep voice, she sounded like Gravel Gerty) "Eat it like a French Souffle". Well, nobody knew what that meant then or now, but she kept repeating it, until Regina couldn't help herself and she stood up and yelled "Eat it like a French Souffle". Maria said the teacher just said sadly, "Girls I wish you wouldn't say that any more"and sent home a note for Maria to help her enforce stopping the dietary comment.

Maria could make you laugh about anything, about Kevin's workers complaining he was too hard on them..."Mr Kevin, I am a man, I am not an animal", about the plumber, she knicknamed Whistling Willie who gave all his instructions to his crew by whistling (nobody understood English). About the cat that threw up all the time, even in their Christmas manger, and peed on their clean clothes. Ria knew where the happy people were, they were in her head laughing at life's little problems, seeing the humor in everything.