We had our last Mass here in St. Sylvia's Church on Sunday.  I was amazed when I drove up, not only was my usual parking spot gone, the whole lot was full, and cars lined both sides of the street.  I found a parking spot and hurried in to see what was going on.  The church was packed, mostly with people I never saw before, but the usual 20 of my fellow regular churchgoers were found among the crowd. There was an organist, and a woman  that would later sing Ave Maria and my favorite where the chorus is Oh Maria, and Salve, salve, salve Regina.  The two usual priests were on the altar, but there was an altar boy and the priest from St. Christopher's, which will be our new parish.

I did get to sit in my usual pew, but I shared with it three other people, all strangers.  Our priest talked on and on, giving the whole history of the church, quoted all the words from Camelot, and then the song the Von Trapp girls sang - "So long, goodbye, auf vedeshein", got in a few digs about "All things news" and  prayed that this beautiful church would not become another restaurant or bistro.

We ended with everyone singing from a handout sheet, "Auld Lang Syne" and I saw more than one person pull out a handkerchief.  So that's that - that beautiful church modeled after a French one, donated by a local wealthy family, whose son was cured at Lourdes, which served all the poor Irish immigrants, working on the railroad, all those baptisms, marriages, First Communions, funerals, all those memories will never happen again.  Sad day for Tivoli, sad day for the Catholic Church.

The turkeys are back, so I thought I would come back too.  Two mothers, one with two small babies, one with seven larger babies.  Today I saw one mother climb onto a high stump and watched as the babies tried to get up, half jumping and half flying.  This must be how they learn to fly.  No nest in a tree to push them out of. 

The Farmer's Almanac has a turkey story for July.  I love the Almanac, full of interesting information,  unlike the internet, there is no need to search, it's just there.  For example, July has two full moons, the first yesterday was the "full buck" moon, on the 31st, it will be the "full thunder" moon, a blue moon. This happens every 2 1/2 tears on an average (another tidbit from the almanac).  July loses19 minutes of daylight from the beginning to the end and in 2005 Jake the dog swam in annual 1.25 mile race from Alcatraz to San Francisco.

Bucky always said "after the fourth of July, the summer is over", a saying that would bring disgust, school just was out, how could it be over?  Yet, time has proven her right again, the summer will fly, like the baby turkeys, and we will be back in reality.

Reading through Aunt Lillian's old diaries and have found some things I want to share with you.  I especially liked this:  April 13, 1999 "our 58th wedding anniversary.  The weather was just like this A.M. Easter Sunday.  Margaret and Ang Fusi dressed me in Margaret's wedding gown at Angie's house.  It was a gorgeous gown.  Handmade lace princess style coat over heavy white satin.  The lace was made by women in Italy who did that at their homes and very few women left to do it now.  That lace would be worth a fortune now.  Margaret loaned it to Betty Randall for her wedding and we never knew what happened to it.  It would never go out of style.

Margaret & Gene were our attendants. The church was so beautifully decorated for Easter.  The priest gave us a special blessing that as we were blessed with all the beautiful flowers in church without cost, we would enjoy such blessings in our life and we did.  We sure needed those blessing.  Me in my borrowed gown and only the clothes I left the " blessed Beacon View" with on my back.

Then a poem:
You got to go to that lonesome valley,
You gotta go there by yourself.
Ain't no one can go there with you,
You gotta go they by yourself.
I'm not afraid of dying, I just don't want to be there when it happens.

And a joke:  2 men sitting in diner having coffee.  Ed noticed something funny about Joe's ear.
He said, "Joe, did you know you have a suppository in your left ear?"

'"I have?" replied Joe.  "A suppository?" and he pulled it out and looked t it hard and said, "Jeez Ed, I'm glad you saw this thing! Now I know where my hearing aid is!"

Tony's mother Sybil died last night.  Years ago when Ria was a baby, she was quite sick and I took her to the doctor's office. When I left the office I met my mother waiting for me outside.  I was probably over tired from staying up all night with a sick baby, and I blurted out that I was afraid she was going to die.  My mother shook her head and told me "It's not that easy to die", words that Sybil proved.  She survived every downfall, broken hips, blood clots, infections, etc.  Sabra and Tony were with her yesterday and one nurse told them that she was a favorite "a real lady".  And she was.

Whenever she visited Sabra, she was carefully groomed, hair done, makeup done, jewelry, a beautiful girl in pictures. a beautiful older woman.  When she had to use a cane, she named it (a doctor had suggested that she would be able to remember where she left it, if the cane was named.)  So she named it Napoleon.  When she had to use a walker, it was decorated with colorful bows. 

Sybil was 94 years old when she died.  A real warrior.  A real lady.  Rest in peace Sybil.

Happy New Year - it's been a while.  I want to list the best of 2014, but first a question, a question I heard sung this summer by Judy Collins - "Who knows where the time goes?"  She talked about the song writer, Sandy Denny, a young girl of only 19 when she wrote the lyrics.  How was she so wise at such an early age?

Anyway, the best of the last:

April in Wellfleet with Laura for her 50th, joined with Jer and Gabi, the seafood, the beaches, the sand piled high from the winter storms, and then the snow, beautiful on the sand.

May the baby turkeys, 15 little yellow balls of fuzz, down, down in numbers, until seven remained, and returned daily, until you could barely tell the difference in size from the mother and babies

July, of course, the family excursion to Wellfleet, the new big house to explore, the animal in the attic, the above named concert, Crissy and the fundador, and the cocktail party at Rachael's house with the view worth a million dollars.

September with Paul, boys and Maureen at the cabin, raining, but still fun and a picture of Daddy on the wall to enjoy.

October was the Street Painting, with Atticus, Regina, Ava, Sabra and family and visit from Liz, Vivien, and Rob...and Michael to help with the Red Riding Hood.  Then the Oysterfest and a picture taken with my old friend Caleb, who looked and sounded healthy and happy.

November the announcement of a new great grandchild, to come in 2015 and in December a concert in the Middle School with Solomon's jazz group doing Autumn Leaves that brought the tears.

The best of course, is little Vivien, who came into this family two months early, tiny but complete and who now is big and beautiful and every picture posted of her brings a smile.  Happy New Year , we will never know where the time goes and what it will bring but we are starting our new adventure.

Timmy's big race yesterday, the only one he does now, because it is free for him....he scores well enough to qualify for the "elite".  He starts training on August 1st, no more beer, two trips to the gym every day, tries to eat less junk food, etc.  It is quite a sacrifice for an effort that lasted exactly one hour, 35 seconds - his time.  Coming in  84th  with over 1900 runners is quite an accomplishment.  The woman standing next to me at the finish line, saw Timmy, and said, "Here comes an old one."  And I told her that it was Timmy.  So he came in first in his age group, 65-69. 

The race to me is kind of like Christmas, all the preparation, all the shopping, the wrapping, the Christmas card list, the stockings to buy for, and then PUFF - it's all over, with just a bag full of ripped wrapping paper to burn.  And a feeling of relief.  And the race does remind me that Thanksgiving, and then Christmas is just around the corner.

We go to the awards ceremony that seems to take forever,. starting with female 15-19, male, 15-19, and on and on until he hits the 60's.  Vince runs the show, and actually got Timmy to run in it when he met Timmy at the Kingston Classic, and was looking for strong runners.  He yelled to Timmy at 7am when we got to Schenectady for the race, "Hello Mr. Haley" - that's the kind of guy he is, knows his runners and can tell a little about each of them.  So there was Timmy standing with the other two finishers, he was in the middle as the first one in, and pictures were being taken.  It looks like a lineup at the police station, and Timmy looks like the guilty one right in the middle.  An older woman (she had just won in the 65-59 age group) was sitting next to me, and I heard her say, "I like that Tim Haley".  Made me smile.  And Vince made a big deal of Timmy's time and saying how he runs every year and that he is from Tivoli. Nice way to finish up the race for the year.

So now on to the real Christmas.

Back again, Halloween has inspired me.  Last night I shared a beer with Maria, Margaret and Patty, all of us used to go into Tivoli, Baileys on the porch one year, and the Black Swan a couple of times. It just isn't the same without them.

I didn't even go up into town this year, but Sabra took Henry and said there was a man dressed like toast, that was standing in the middle of the road.  That gave me a memory of many years ago, when Tivoli became famous on Halloween, but not for any good reason.

Tivoli used to have a clean up day - it was great - you could put out anything, appliances, old furniture, etc, and they took it all to the dump.  But the year I am remembering, it wasn't carefully thought out.  Clean Up day came a few days before Halloween, and the local kids took advantage of it.  On Halloween night, it was a Saturday that year, the kids turned the center of Tivoli into a house.  There was a kitchen with a refrigerator, table, a living room with couches and chairs, and everything else that had picked up before the Village.  There was a picture in the newspaper of the mess, and as I remember, Laura and others were sitting on the couch, big smiles on their faces. 

Monsignor Kane was vivid the next day at Mass.  Driving to church, the town was in disrepair, an outhouse remained at the four corners, and toilet paper was hanging from every telephone line.  There was no sermon that morning, just how terrible our kids were, why weren't they supervised, how could a firetruck or ambulance get through that mess, on and on.  But actually, I was thinking about Halloween in Beacon when I was a kid.  We threw eggs, soaped windows, and tied threads across the road, tree to tree.  A car going through the threads made a terrible noise, and the drivers would stop and get out and look at their tires, while we hid behind the bushes.  Phone pranks were another thing we did:  "Is your street light on?" and after they came back to the phone and said "yes" , we would say, "Then blow it out."  That's when trick or treat really meant something.