Tonight, with the aid of my phone's assistive light, I saw another sure sign that Spring was taking hold: Snowdrops just below my mother's porch! They were closed for the night, but up and fully blossomed. My mother, to honor the changing seasons, had also put away the sleigh and in it's stead a basket with the dinosaur egg. This is the first year, ever, that I've born witness to whole neighborhoods still decked in Christmas lights, some still half buried in the snow, while also sporting Easter flags or Egg Trees. It's been a long, cold and deeply snowing Winter!
Three of us went out to dinner tonight; a pre-celebration of Easter and a belated celebration of my stepfather's birthday. Just the three of us. The two meals I ate today were both with my Mother.
Just as I was about to drive to my mechanic this morning, Mom pulled into my driveway. She offered to drive me back, as I was going to walk the mile, which is my way during tune-up & oil changes. I was going to drop in on the bagel shop, too during the walk home to get some treats for breakfast for the kids, as we didn't have school today.
I accepted her offer and invited her to have breakfast with me at the bagel shop, as the kids were still asleep, and it would be nice. We had a yummy and leisurely meal together.
Mom had dropped my stepfather for an appointment and didn't plan to stay long. So after breakfast we returned to my house in her car. Mom had come with a basket of Easter gifts for our house, as my kids we going to their father's this afternoon. The basket was full of middle eastern treats, cheese, fruit rolls and three dark red eggs my Mother dyed. The classic red dye is no longer being sold by the Lebanese grocer where we've always bought it. It's been deemed "not healthy", so they are going back to red onion skins and wine vinegar. My mother used beet juice, wine vinegar and red food coloring to get them so deeply red. Then she polishes them with olive oil to give them an added luster. She left shortly after delivering the basket and giving the kids a hug.
She also brought us a dozen hardboiled white eggs and some colors of dye and a paraffin stick. After she left the kids and I spent engaged in our spring ritual of creating design, coloring, texturing and dying the eggs. Each an individual work of art and a wonderful way to spend time together. Every year the art changes as we continue to do so with each season of our lives.
The afternoon was spent with each of doing our own thing. I had bills to pay, Educational Travel details to tie up with my consultant, SAT courses to register for and loads of other little things that are best done online or on the phone during hours I'm usually at work.
Their father came earlier than usual, picked them up, I continued to tie up loose ends and then drove to Mom and David's to pick them up for our dinner date. The drive over was dusted with raindrops. None too big and mostly a sprinkle. By the time I got them into my car, there were no raindrops, only snowdrops. Dinner at a fancy-ish Italian place was nice. Reasonable people watching, delicious fish, mussels, risotto ball and veggies. We all shared everything. I let David pick the dessert, as he was the birthday boy: 84yrs young! Turns out I don't care for Tiramisu, but he loved it, which is all that mattered!
Lots of talks of family and friends. Little talk of work and books. Just passed last night's book, All the Light We Cannot See, to Mom and it triggered great fodder for discussion of WWII.
David, at the time of the novel, 1944, was 13 years old at a Summer Camp in Vermont. He was receiving daily mailings of a progressive New York newspaper, that his parent subscribed him to, with writers like I.F. Stone and introducing Walt Kelly's PoGo. It also had a tiny map of Saint-Malo in Brittany with the lines of the allies advancing with each arrival of the post. David, at the time, was the Editor of the Camp's newspaper: The Thunderbird!
Mom has only just begun the book, but it emotionally started to pull her back to an earlier age. Mom used to tell me stories of how growing up in a house on the top of Edgemoor Rd in Belmont, she'd see stars appear in windows of her neighbors houses and it meant that older brother's of friends in the neighborhood had been killed in the war. Tonight she didn't mention that story, but the intensity of the emotional effect the opening chapters had on her, made me believe those stories and boys will resurface as she dives more deeply into the pages and narrative.
Drove them home, gave David his gift and each of them a little sweet something. Leaving the drive way the rain start to fall in earnest. By the time I hit Walden Pond, still covered in ice and melting to form a low ground fog, the drops were getting heavier. At the Concord rotary, the wipers needed to be on medium, and by the Ice Pond at the end of my street, full blast.
Now I lie in bed, with a snoring dog at my side, thinking of Easters of my youth, War novels I've read & taught, and how wonderful it would be to have one day where there was no war on earth. All could rise safely, with purpose, expect to grow old and have fresh water falling from the sky be a sign of life.
Good Night, Passover/Easter/New Year folks, G'night!
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