Another sweet surprise. This time, I’ve come across a poem written by Dad. In 1943, when his family moved from Lowell, Massachusetts, to New Haven, Connecticut, Dad was placed in Mom‘s eighth-grade class at Saint Francis School. As told in greater detail in this earlier “Angels and angles” story, Dad was kicked up to ninth grade in a different school after inadvertently correcting a nun during math class. But before the transfer, Dad wrote a poem. It was included in…
A horrifying fact is that pianos aren’t worth much anymore. Used pianos, that is. If you look on any “Buy/Sell/Trade” pages these days, there’s nearly always a lovely piano or two: Free. Pick-up only. Electronic keyboards are excellent. I remember my brother Dave getting one when we were in high school. Apparently they were invented primarily for apartment-dwellers, so that pianists could play (using headphones) without disturbing the neighbors. They’re also less expensive and easier to move around. Still, it’s…
Since retirement three years ago, it’s been fun to dabble in genealogy on Ancestry.com. Our family tree, at this point, looks much wider than tall. Geez, there were some huge families just a few generations back! The DNA tests that Farmer Gary and I took some years ago involved spitting into small tubes and mailing them off to Ancestry. My saliva was bubbly while Gary’s was flat. (I still wonder what that means.) Every so often, Ancestry emails with the…
Mom absolutely loved being a grandma. Over the years, she and Dad were blessed with seven grandchildren. Many summers ago, they enjoyed hosting five of those little varmints while vacationing in Ogunquit, Maine. (James and Lucy weren’t born yet.) Here’s a story Mom wrote 30 years ago, remembering that special time. Half a Hot Dog with Johnny It is October and three of our grandchildren are in school and thriving. I think of last August and the various times the…
My middle brother, Dave, wove together this remembrance of family and friends returning to Madison a few months ago to honor Dad’s memory in a heartfelt Celebration of Life: On June 11, about 40 family members and friends gathered at my parents’ spiritual home, St. Margaret’s Catholic Church in Madison, Connecticut. Dad had passed away in April of the previous year, before the risks COVID posed had diminished significantly, and this had limited the number of people who attended his…
“Gary Werne! Not again!” My husband got a nervous look on his face, but quickly replied: “Those boxes aren’t for me. They’re for Mr. Wense.” Several boxes had arrived that day from multiple mail-order book clubs. Another batch of books we had not ordered, from book clubs of which Gary was already a member. Gary, who never before nor since has shown the least sign of sneakiness, was simply the victim of a mailing-list typo. Flash back to 41 years…
“Cold soup? Ewww!” Poor Dad had just arrived home from a business trip to the Phoenix area and was excited to tell us about the new foods he’d enjoyed. I, for one, was not the least bit tempted by the thought of cold tomato soup full of chopped fresh vegetables. But for Dad, this was a heavenly combination. He loved vegetables. Especially fresh, home-grown veggies. From the date of Mom‘s poem, below, I can guess she took a train and…
May 28 is a special day for our family. It’s Dad‘s birthday. He would have been 92 this year. And oh, how he would have loved to have been in Terre Haute, Indiana, on that day. … because May 28 this year was also the day James graduated from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, with a double major (Electrical Engineering and Math) plus a Master’s degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering. But for Dad it would have been even more than…
Growing up on Chatham Street in New Haven, Connecticut, Mom loved her “little room.” Nowadays, we might call it a walk-in closet. Back in the 1940s, it was a room with a window and a desk. For writing, for studying, for dreaming. Even more special was the view. The window looked out into the front yard, where there was a spruce tree. And as Mom grew up, so did that tree. A year ago, I asked Dad if Mom had…
Did you see the news story the other day involving the sudden wedding of two members of the Ukrainian Defense Forces? Lesya Ivashchenko and Valeriy Filimonov weren’t planning to hold their ceremony during war time, but decided to make their vows on Sunday at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Kyiv. This year would have been my parents’ 70th anniversary. They were married in New Haven on a Tuesday, while Dad was on leave from the Army. Dad had a…