A dozen rememberances

Well I was on the same path on your e-mails and will highlight some of the things I remember from age 1- 6 years old or so… little and big things.

Oh I went to Mesa Verde and saw a mountain lion but will post that later.

Episodic rambling and rememberings. Sorry, I tried to add this as a comment but it was too long. And I purposely left out any golf references as that is another whole post.

1. I remember the smells of Mim’s home .. more lately in Colorado. The big attic fan that they had upstairs… the whoosh when she turned it on and I would like to turn it on and off.. which of course drove her a little batty but she was OK with that. When we ate there, she did poached eggs and had butter on them.. Mimi was the ham, biscuits, pumpkin pie and "ice from the front of the refrigerator" grandmother; Mother Bernice was the tomato sandwich, fruit, yoguart and chicken grandmother.
   
2. Wheat bread was big, the coffee pot in her kitchen, I can smell it. And she would talk with that little click, click sound to make a point.
3. In the house they had little hide closets and Upton had the ‘latest cameras, gloves, hats, gadgets. I remember mowing their lawn with the first gas lawnmowers… one was a blade mower with a gas engine.. far to dangerous for a kid today. They had an electric one for a while but it was impractical. I am sure someone ran over the chord. I would mow the lawn and had to push it along the little hill and watch the flowers.
4. They had one of the first a.c.s and color tvs in town. They had that garage door (it started as a single garage and then they added on a double. With the buttons to open and close.
5. Mimi would take me walking in the dark around her neighborhood and we would stop at the Van Horns and the adults would talk in the dark late into the night in the back.
6. Once for no really known reason to me I stole a bike from a neighbors around the corner from Mimi and Papa. My only, well second only, attempt at a life of crime. I instantly ditched it and Mimi saw it all or a neighbor did. They talked with me in kindness. A few weeks later, Kelly and I both got new bikes—a red and green Schwinn from Papa.
7. In playing cards – mainly gin --Papa had his sayings. ‘Eighter from Decader, sweet Molly, and some others that are on the back of my mind right now. He used to smoke cigars but gave them up. He would fall asleep watching golf and snore, like Richard, like Kelly, like me….
8. We sued to spend te night on the roof above the TV room. Mimi would take out mattresses and we all slept outside. I remember hearing the oil wells in the distance and imagine they were monsters… dragons… coming to eat us. Also I was a star gazer then and loved the stars on her deck.
9. At Ward Buick, the cigar smells were stronger and you girls did not have to learn of the smells n the men’s bathroom where Papa’s cigars, Mr. Diggs pipe and Lysol was used to cover up other odors… including grease and Buick magazines.
10. As a kid Mary would take me fro rides to Chrystal Plunge… I ad a bad habit of throwing things about the car… Mary and I remembered that lately. She was really nice and never seemed to get angry.
11. A big, big thing was the new car showings. Then there were balloons and cake and free gifts and it was like a big party for the town. Then you gave away t-shirts and stuff with logos, you didn’t try to sell them. Then you saw ad smelled th new cars and the new model year….
12. Funny, I used to like to play the piano.. chopsticks and such at Mimi’s. She was pretty tolerant but there were occasions she would basically say, enough is enough. I never heard her play, nor anyone else there. But obviously someone taught me those songs. Heart and Soul, etc.

The older I get, the more I look on those years as truly wonderful. I just had lunch with a guy from a dysfunctional family. If we were, I did not know it. In Mimi and Papa’s home, it felt like post WWII and something akin to Ossie and Harriet… there was a quiet in it but more f solitude and spending the day there was one of relaxation. Oh yes, the phone downstairs and upstairs… and I remember Mimi talking on it. The number was 653 I the old days. Then 6653. I think The Glover’s was 2474. The sound of fans, the sound of solitude and quiet, reading a comic book or Life magazine, a kind of coolness from the trees and open widnows and breezes.. and Mimi’s smile and Upton’s soft gruffness that usually would break into a smile. And the stories… always stories..