We had dinner at Mom's house last weekend. It was a celebration, as get-togethers in our family often are: Jane was in town for the weekend, and she and Mom had spent the day gathering documents for the Tax Man, meeting with said Tax Man (or, you know, Mom's accountant), then gathering more documents for Da Man.
MB and MD and Mistah and I descended upon Mom and Jane for dinner -- an hour late, but who's counting? -- and we had just a
lovely meal.
I mean,
look at this lovely table. Is it not civilized and staid and elegant?
We had steak, cooked to
Dad-perfection Mark-Dowd-perfection.
(Mark Dowd was wearing Bill's vest which he'd left at Jane's house at Christmas and Jane returned. Mark kept calling it his "Guatemalan Man Vest". Nobody knew quite why.)
We had asparagus and sauteed mushrooms and onions and fries (in honor of Dad) and salad. It was all just gorgeous.
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| This photo perfectly captures the getting-everything-on-the-table portion of the evening. |
We ate like royalty, we yakked and yakked, and we talked for ages about Dad, which was cathartic and sad and wonderful and intense. We all shared our own personal chronology about the morning of July 23. And, oddly, all of us there on Saturday night were apart that morning of July 23, except for Mistah and me. Mom had Julie with her at the hospital, Mistah and I were with Jacquie at the condo, Jane was with Doug in Wisconsin, MB was at Mark's, Mark was driving to work. Ann was due in to CT the next day.
We all had
lots of details to share, to think about, to re-sear into our memories . . .
And then, it was time for MB and MD to go home. And for the camera to come out.
We are, I think, a fantastically
beautiful family. Really. And I mean that in the humblest possible way: I'm not talking about me; I'm talking about my sisters.
Saturday night, though?
Well -- except for Jane and Mom -- well, now, I'm just not so sure . . .
I mean, I have a wee, wee Mom, and wee, wee sisters, and anybody's going to look, um, large next to them . . .
. . . but I sort of look like the size of the side of a barn.
But at least I have my eyes open . . .
. . . oh, wait.
Sigh. Not so fast, Kowalksy.
I mean, really. How can so many fantastically beautiful people take so many fantastically terrible photos in a row?
Oh look! MB's giving Jacquie her
"I'm okay, don't you worry about me, Mom" sign!
Jane's not buying it.
She's
so not buying it; she
may be starting to get annoyed.
There we go.
There are my lovelies.
Oh, my darling lovelies.
8 comments:
Those photos are hysterical! What a fun night that was. xoxo
Love it Ellie - we had our own papparazzi that night in our Schlecker.... great fun. xo mom
It is a beautiful family, you included.
Oh my gosh, I love you people. Those really are... um, great (?) photos. the first one of you and MB with matching gigantic grins looks like a poster for special camp. And I love the ones where mom is looking at Jane. So great, I can totally put myself in that room. That room which is such a huge part of my late-on-July 23 memories. Mom in there making kibee for like 16 hours. The rest of us circling around like zombies. Ach.
love you
Jacquie
Oh, you're right, Jacquie -- MB and I *do* look special.
And July 23 was the day when it took Mom all day to make tabbouleh, it took Julie all day to go for a run, it took me all day to clean 2 bathrooms, it took MB all day to get Mom's cable fixed, and it took *you* all day to buy your husband an airplane ticket.
You were distracted, of course, by giving Mary Ellen our beer order. You are a good, pragmatic girl, sistah.
xxE
Lovelies, lovelies, lovelies. And good sports regarding the photo session. And you can cook. And drink. And laugh. And be sad and wonderful and intense.
lovelie!
xo,
Beth
What's up with the crossword puzzles, ladies? I am a NYTimes fan, myself.
That's the Saturday NYTimes puzzle, Unmitigated. The best one of the week. Photocopied for us courtesy of Mom, who is keeping Dad's puzzle-photocopying-for-his-offspring tradition alive.
E.
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