Baked Ziti Night

One of my favorite things when I was young was Baked Ziti Night at my grandparent's house. All of my aunts and uncles would be there, and the few cousins from that side of the family.

My grandmother would make this huge pan of baked ziti.

When it was done we would all be gathered around my grandmother, waiting with our pristine white pasta dishes for that luscious scoop of pasta and cheese and sauce. Gram would give us each a big cheesy spoonful and a sprinkling of parmesan cheese. My mouth waters just thinking about it.

I’d always looked forward to those gatherings... the congregation of our extended family, reconnecting with each other, sharing stories and laughter and baked ziti. And on those nights when absolutely everyone showed up, and I had to sit at the "kids table," I didn't even mind. It was that good.

Those family get-togethers didn't happen as much in my teenage years. Even less after I went off to college.

Eventually my grandmother started to loose her grip on things mentally, and making those big dinners became too much for her. A few of us would gather for Pizza Night on Wednesdays, but it wasn’t the same as having the whole gang together.

After my grandmother passed away, we made it Chinese Food Night because my grandfather was tired of pizza. Sometimes I would cook something up for us homemade, especially when it was just my grandfather, my daughter and me, but of course it could never rival the baked ziti with the sauce of tomatoes from Gram’s garden.

After my grandfather passed away, my aunts and uncles had to clean out the old house on 4th Street. There was a huge dumpster out in the front yard, and my aunt E was pitching everything in there she could get her hands on.

I don't think anything really has any sentimental value to her. She likes nice new things. Old things are garbage.

So there I was, salvaging some of the things that reminded me of my grandparents. There was the Bunny Cup, a little purple plastic cup with a bunny on it. As kids, after riding our bikes up and down the dead-end street, or playing catch in the back yard, we would race to the cabinet to get the Bunny Cup. It was an honor of distinction to be the one sipping your cream soda from it.

There were a few boxes of papers that I decided to keep too. Since my grandfather was blind, these boxes made no sense. There would be store receipts from 1986 mixed in with oil bills from 1972, mixed in with newspapers clippings of Elvis and the moon landing, mixed in with recipes my grandmother used. One box even contained my grandfather's army yearbook and old newspapers from when he was stationed in North Africa in 1945. My aunt would have surely thrown these away. I took them home and sorted through everything.

You know what else I saved from the dumpster? The baked ziti dishes. There were only 3 left, with a few chips along the rims, and a few cracks in the glaze. And since three doesn't make a complete set, oh yeah, my aunt was throwing them out. But I saved them, along with all those fond memories of when we were all together.

And besides, there's one dish for each of us: my husband and my daughter and me. So really, three does make a complete set.

A Moblem Of Prime

Sometimes I have a bit of a speaking dyslexia. I think it happens when my brain is working faster than my mouth can keep up with. What I end up doing is exchanging the first letters of two words.

Some recent examples:

“Know what I had for lunch today? A Chilly Freesesteak!”

“My daughter’s room is pretty big, about 600 fare squeet.”

“Leave me alone for a while. I need to nake a tap.”

These are all total accidents. I couldn’t do it on purpose if I tried. Well, I mean I guess I could, but I’d have to sit there and really think about which letters to switch.

What’s scary is that it might be contagious. Oh yeah, I’m not sure how, but I think my husband is catching it. The other day he asked me if I’ve heard from Duncle Ave.

“Uncle Dave???”

Unfortunately for Duncle Ave, the new name has stuck.

Of course, Sean will still make fun if he catches me in one. The other night I asked him if he wanted to take a hide out to Rome… I mean, a ride out to Home Depot.

“You switchin’ shit up again?”

“Shut uuuuuup!” I whined.

And then more quietly, under my breath: “Fother Mucker.”

Toys in the Attic

I get the call on Saturday at noon. I have lots of plans for the weekend, as I usually do, but I have to drop everything. This is an emergency.

“I’m cleaning out the attic today over at the old house,” my mother announces. “If you want any of this stuff you’d better come down here.”

The “old house” is the house I grew up in. I moved out years ago, and my mother had moved out several years before that. The house has been vacant for a while. But recently, my mother decided to fix the place up so she can rent it out. Step one, of course, is to get it cleaned out.

“I don’t think you’d want any of that old crap anyway, but I just thought I’d check.”

As a matter of fact, I do want that old crap. It’s MY old crap. My Childhood Old Crap. I’m talking about the Hollie Hobby Oven here. I’m talking Atari with all the old games. I know when she says “old crap” she is not EVEN referring to Space Invaders. That game is awesome.

And what about my Baby Chrissy doll? Or the Farrah Fawcett Barbie with the white halter pantsuit? And Wonder Woman! Dear God, this stuff is priceless!

I am in my car in 5 minutes flat. I don’t even shower.

This is an emergency!!!

The old house is about an hour away. Traffic laws are meaningless in a situation such as this.

As I pull in the driveway, I know that my concerns are not ill-founded. My mother has been here since 7am this morning, and there is already a huge pile of stuff out at the curb.

And what do I see at the top of the pile, the Garbage Pile, still in the original box that Santa gave to me back in 1976? As I get out of the car, I am shaking my head in disbelief.

“For crying out loud, Mom, my Lite Brite? How could you?!”

“What would you want that old thing for?”

The woman just doesn’t understand.

Not that she doesn’t understand about being a packrat, mind you. Oh no, she knows plenty about that. She is, of course, saving those boxes full of files from the company she used to work at five years ago. Because, well, you never know. And she’s trying to salvage that old desk that is literally falling into unrecognizable pieces as she drags it outside into the front yard.

And yet, she sees no value in my Dino Bank???

“I’m on my way home to get some lunch,” Mom says. “I’ll be back in about an hour.”

So I have an hour. One hour to go through the refuse pile she has amassed by the mailbox. I dig right in.

An hour later, my car is loaded to the top. The Six Million Dollar Man has been reunited at long last with the Bionic Woman. Charlie’s Angels have been spared the cruel fate of the dump. Ditto for their van.

What am I going to do with all my old crap? Well, I’m not quite sure. I suppose anything I’m not necessarily emotionally attached to will probably find its way to ebay.

I wonder if there’s anything I’m not emotionally attached to? I’m a very emotional person.

Later on at home, I am trying to explain to Mandy just how awesome my favorite toy is. I don’t know why she’s not getting it. I’ve even turned out the lights so we can get the full effect. Maybe if I sing the jingle…

"Lite-Brite, makin' things with light!
Outtasite, makin' things with Lite-Brite!"

“Can I go back to playing World of Warcraft now?”

“No, c’mon! This is great! I still have all the pegs! Let’s write your name in different colors, and then you can put it in your room if you want.”

So now Lite Brite is on top of the entertainment unit in Mandy’s room, in between the lava lamps. It’s a fitting place for it. And although it used to say Mandy, a few days ago it was illuminating a colorful flower, and now there’s a picture of a bunny.

Lite Brite lives on!

Still Snowbound...

No time to write today, so I'm posting more snow pics...

Geese in the Orchard

The Winning Numbers

When my grandfather was alive, I would visit him every Sunday and Wednesday.

Mandy was just a little thing, but she enjoyed our visits too. Pop was fun. He played songs for her on his keyboard, and he let her play it too. And he was very animated as he told her funny stories.

He always put Jeopardy on at seven o’clock. He loved to hear me answering the questions, especially the “final Jeopardy.”

“You should go on that show,” he would say. “You could make a lot of money.”

Pop knew I had no money. I was a single mother from the day my daughter was born. I didn’t have a dime to my name before she was born, since I was working three jobs to pay my way through college. After she was born I had even less. He was always trying to give me money.

“Here, take this twenty.”

“No, Pop. You don’t have to do that.”

“Take it for you and the baby. Just take it. I’m sure there’s something you need.”

I would make him lunch and dinner while we were there, too. He loved when I cooked for him.

“Why does toasted cheese always taste better when you make it?” he would ask.

“Because it’s nice to be taken care of sometimes,” I would tell him.

Pop was blind for the last 15 years of his life. He still took care of himself just fine, though, and people who met him didn’t even realize that he couldn’t see. And he would always figure out ways to do tasks that seemed beyond the capability of a blind 75 year old man, like taking out his air conditioner or grouting a loose tile in the bathroom.

But there were some things he just couldn’t do alone, like going to the store. And since he couldn’t go to the store, he couldn’t “play the numbers.” So every Sunday and Wednesday he would give me some money (yes he was blind, but he always knew which bill in his pocket was the $5 and which was the $20) and I would play the “Pick 3” for him. I always left his house with little scraps of paper in my pocket with his numbers written down: 616, 327, 684…

He won fairly often, too.

Sometimes the numbers were birthdays or other important dates. Sometimes he was trying to use a system, and he would pick his numbers based on the number from the day before.

“Put in 817 for me. See yesterday was 726, so I’m gonna go one up on the 7, one down on the 2, and one up on the 6. We should do alright, as long as it’s not Yolanda Vega.”

Yolanda Vega was one of the women who announced the numbers on TV. Pop never liked her. “She picks terrible numbers,” he would say.

Well one day Pop called me, all excited. “Did you hit too?” he asked.

“Huh?”

“The numbers. I was wondering if you hit too, since we played your birthday, 427.”

“Oh, are you kiddin’? I didn’t play it.”

“You didn’t play it?”

“Nah, I don’t usually play. I usually just put yours in.”

Truth was, I had forgotten to put his numbers in. We had stayed with Pop later than usual the night before. Mandy was getting cranky, and I had just gone straight home and put her to bed.

“Which store did you get them from?”

“Baisley’s.” I lied. I lied to my grandfather. But how could I tell him that I didn’t put the numbers in? What else did my grandfather have to look forward to, besides my visits and playing the numbers?

“You’ll have to go back and see how much we won.”

So I drove to the bank to see how much money I had. $367.42. I wasn’t sure which bills had gone through and which were still pending, but it didn’t matter. I took out $350 and went to see my grandfather.

“Here it is, Pop. You hit for $350.”

“Yeah? $350?”

I called out each denomination as I handed him the bills, so he knew what they were. “Here’s a fifty, and another fifty, and a twenty…” He was grinning from ear to ear.

“So you didn’t play your birthday, huh?”

“Nope. Too bad… we could’ve both hit. That would have been fun.”

After I handed him all the money, he gave me a hundred back.

“Keep this for you and Amanda,” he said.

“No, Pop. You don’t have to do that. These are your winnings.”

“Well it was your birthday that hit. Here, take it. I’m sure there’s something you need. Go buy something for you and my great-granddaughter.”

“How about if I take the three of us out to lunch?”

I can’t remember if I bounced any checks that month. I probably did, but I really don’t remember. The only thing I do remember, now that 10 years have passed and my grandfather is gone, is that I made him happy that day. And that’s all that matters.

Close Encounters

I’m pretty much assuming I have 9 lives, like a cat.

I think I used one of them up on the way home from Maine many summers ago…

Mandy is about seven years old, and I have just started letting her sit in the front seat of the car. I’m still a little nervous about the airbag being too powerful for her little frame. But we are sightseeing through the north woods of Maine. From the little cabins out on Moosehead Lake, out to Lubec where we pitched a tent on the rocky shoreline, down to Bar Harbor where we fell asleep to the sound of the waves and coyotes calling from the mountaintops. We are planning to end the trip in Boston visiting my friend Tracy.

Well Tracy is expecting us on Friday night, and we have stopped off in Freeport on Friday to watch the sun set. We still have quite a ways to go. So after snapping some pictures and getting some lobster rolls, we are on our way.

My eyes start rolling up into my head, so I enlist Mandy’s help in keeping me awake. We have taken many road trips together, and she understands my need to keep talking so I can keep driving. We make up a few dozen new verses to the Diarrhea Song. We quote lines from Disney movies and make the other person guess which movie it was. Bonus points for knowing the character who said it.

She makes me explain to her, for the umpteenth time, why she is not allowed to watch rated R movies. Mandy’s friend at school is allowed to watch them. She really wants to see The Sixth Sense, because he keeps telling her about it. I explain that it is too scary for her. “But why?” So I tell her what the movie is about, and describe the entire story from start to finish, which keeps me awake for the next half hour.

Finally, Mandy is falling asleep. I can’t stay awake either, so I pull off the highway and into the well-lit parking lot of a church. I figure no one will disturb me here, and I close my eyes.

After grabbing a little cat-nap, I am back on the road.

As I’m driving, I am passed several times by packs of cars that speed by me doing about 90mph or so. Although I am driving with my brights on for most of the trip, I switch to the low-beams as these groups of cars fly by me. They are out of sight pretty quickly, since I’m only going about 65.

Then, up ahead, I see a sign that says BOSTON 90 MILES.

I speed up to about 70. Maybe even 75. I’m thinking I can get to Boston by about 1:30am.

From the point of view of the large bull moose, a pack of lights had gone zipping by, and then there was quiet and darkness. He steps up onto the roadway and begins to cross the Maine Turnpike, just north of the tolls near Wells.

Luckily I am feeling very refreshed from the nap, because the next thing I see illuminated by my low-beams is knees.

And by the time my low beams are striking moose knees at 75mph, I am nearly on top of this massive animal.

And my daughter is in the front seat for the first time.

I jerk the wheel hard to the left. Really hard. I don’t even think about it, I just react. Somehow, I don’t hit the moose. I have no idea how I could have missed him, unless he jumped straight up into the air. Or maybe it was my cat-like reflexes.

But such a maneuver at this speed sends my little Cavalier careening sideways toward the center guardrail. I try to turn into the skid, but I quickly find myself fish-tailing the other way. The only thing I can think is Don’t hit anything. The airbag could kill her.

I break all of my nails as I rip the steering wheel back and forth. Camping equipment and Nilla wafers and seashells are being tossed all over the car. We fishtail nine times before coming to a stop on the side of the highway.

Mandy is awake now, of course. “What happened Mommy?” She sounds calm.

I am hyperventilating. I can hardly get the word out.

“Ma… ma… ma… ma… MOOSE!”

“It’s okay Mom. We’re okay now.”

We drive very slowly to Boston. I don’t think we exceed 50. Cars are flying by, wailing their horns at me, but this is all I can handle.

She is talking to me some more. She knows I need her. We are both wide awake.

“Tracy is going to be really freaked out when I tell her what happened,” I say.

“You know what would freak her out more?”

“What?”

“If we are already dead. Like in The Sixth Sense. And we don’t even know it, so we just go to her house like everything is normal. But when she comes to the door, we are ghosts standing there, all bloody and stuff. Maybe we have big pieces of glass sticking out of us and stuff.”

She’s right. That would definitely freak her out. It’s freaking me out.

But luckily, Mandy seems to have 9 lives, just like me.