Grandma Cassidy had five granddaughters. I’m the oldest, then there’s Bunny’s two girls: Suzanne and Beth, and Ray’s two daughters: Marie and Claire. And so it feels like Grandma has been at work behind the scenes and in cahoots with the angels to remind one granddaughter that she had a copy of this wonderful memoir written by another granddaughter many years ago. Suzanne emailed it to me the other day. With Marie’s permission, here is that essay, which she wrote…
Growing up, our family had a Christmas tradition of going around the dinner table and each naming our favorite gift. Not the gift of family, faith, talent, or brains. This was about what had awaited us under the tree that morning. A toy, a doll, a game. Looking back over the decades, I’d have to say my favorite unwrap-it gift involved multi-generational family members, plus talent. It was this painting: In short, this is a painting that Grandpa Vayo (Dad’s…
It’s National Hat Day, had you heard? Feels like a good excuse to pull together photos of family members and their fancy chapeaux from over the past 100 years. This first picture is of my great-grandfather Patrick Cassidy. He was a police officer, first in Belfast and then in New Haven, Connecticut. This photo is from around 1915. Here’s one of Patrick’s sons, Christy, looking snazzy: Another of Patrick’s four sons, Frank, was also a policeman. And my grandpa. Hopping…
I can just hear my Grandma Cassidy bursting forth with that staccato laugh of hers, and then chiding me for using the word “gospel” in the title of this post. But Grandma, it’s okay. I didn’t capitalize “gospel,” so I don’t need to go to confession over this. We’re good. My younger brother was crazy about Grandma, too. Six years younger than me, Bill had a few extra years living close to her once Mom and Dad moved back to…
As odd as this year’s Christmas will be (given the pandemic), it’s not the first time history has gifted parents with holiday challenges. For example, wartime. I can only imagine how my grandparents went to extra effort to keep those Decembers jolly for their young children. In 1943, staples such as sugar, meat, and coffee could only be obtained via food ration books – and even then, only when the items were available. Even after the world war was over,…
My dear Uncle Bill is gone. It wasn’t a surprise. Bill was 93 and had been in extended care for 18 months or so. But it still hurts like hell. Bill was an old-fashioned family man. As a young fellow, he permitted his mother and future mother-in-law (my Grandma Cassidy) to fix him up with a stunning redhead. “Oh, boy. Those legs,” he remembered decades later, from his bed in The Guilford House. His walk was no longer steady, but…
Mom collected a lot more than books. She collected friends. We moved around a lot in the 1960s and ’70s, and she stayed in touch with each group of friends and neighbors. This was pre-email, of course. Dad used to tease that Mom kept the post office solvent. One friend was Newbery-winning author Madeleine L’Engle. In a future post, I’ll share some of their correspondence. In the meantime, I read L’Engle’s most famous book (finally!) this month. Week 1: A…
My great-uncle Pip was an animal lover. The more I ask relatives about him, the more I learn about the animals he loved. Many dogs over the decades. But it didn’t stop there. A goat named Fanny. A horse named Spot. Sheep. Bees, even. And today is his birthday. He was the eleventh and final child born to Joe and Maggie Regan, Irish immigrants who settled in New Haven in 1888. Pip, baptized Edward Thomas Regan, was born November 17,…
Farmer Gary sets an annual goal for himself: Complete the harvest before Thanksgiving. Yesterday, he finished combining ‘beans and today he’s planting the last of the winter crops. And all without a scarecrow. I can’t help but wonder if “city folk” would even know about scarecrows were it not for The Wizard of Oz. (As an aside, it still makes me laugh to remember Harry’s high school story about sitting in a quiet classroom, taking a final exam. The silence…
As Halloween fast approaches, it is time to tell my cousin Suzanne’s story about Grandma and the Bats. The year was 1985. The place was our maternal Grandma‘s house in New Haven. Our mothers’ cute childhood home at 33 Chatham Street was a wedding gift from Grandma’s parents in 1929. Grandpa had passed away three years earlier and Grandma was delighted when Suzie accepted her invitation to be roomies. Suzanne was recently out of college and had several part-time jobs…