The Last Day of February

Hurrah. The last day of February at last and no leap year to worry about either. I always looked forward to this day when I was a kid. Here’s why.

Two of my cousins, Diane and Mary Sue and my sister, Sally’s birthdays are all in February. They all had parties when we were growing up, which I attended, but (hee hee) I was just biding my time. I knew that come the first week of March it was my turn to have a party. Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t think I was really mean about having to wait till March, and I don’t think I rubbed it in when March 5^th did come, but it was always in the back of my mind, nevertheless.

Sally always got a Valentine’s Day party because her birthday was the day after Valentine’s Day. My mother, not wanting me to feel bad about this fact, always gave me a St. Patrick’s Day theme for my party, even though that day doesn’t come till March 17^th. I didn’t mind, it was kind of fun. So come February 28 or 29 as the case may be, I was ready for my special day.

Another reason I was happy to see the last of February was probably the same reason all of you did. Hopefully, we all thought, the worst of winter is over. As kids I don’t think we minded all that much, but the older we got, the more we were anxious for spring to come.

March in Maine, however, is tricky. It’s very possible to get a surprise snowstorm in March, which is exactly what happened on March 5, 1941, when I came into this world.

Our mothers were always happy to see the last of the snow and slush. The only thing they had to put up with when things started to melt, was the mud. I can still see the boardwalks that led into many of our houses so we wouldn’t track mud into the house. And who remembers “mud rooms?”

Besides the advent of my birthday; the warm spring breezes to come; the shedding of heavy winter clothes, especially those darn Brewster suits; there was also the fact that on March 5 I was one year older. Each year, hopefully, brought more privileges due to my age that were not possible before.

For instance, when I turned five or six, I was able to begin dance classes with Madelyn Oliver, later Drinkwater. It was a real thrill to me the first day my mother brought me to the tower room of the Community Center for my first lesson.

Around 8 or 9 my cousin Diane and I were allowed to attend Methodist Church Camp, or as we called it, Mechawana, in Winthrop, Maine. We were among the first campers to ever attend that camp. The first time we attended I believe was in 1949 and it was the first time I at least had ever slept away from home. I did well and had a wonderful time. I came back year after year, as did Diane. I was never homesick and the leaders, who we called “Aunt” and “Uncle,” always came to me when someone was homesick to bring them out of it so they could enjoy their time at camp. Age brings privileges you see.

At around 12-years-old, Diane and I were allowed to take horseback riding lessons up on the West Meadow Road. I never became an expert equestrian, but I did enjoy it very much. As most girls that age, I was in love with horses and had an extensive “horse” collection.

As I grew over the years, I always looked for something new to learn or to have fun with. With the help of my parents and the support of some very special people in my family and in the South End, I believe I developed into a “good citizen,” which was always important to my father.

This year is a milestone for me as I turn 70. We’ll discuss that fact later on next month. I still look for new things to learn about and ways to expand my personal education. I look forward to further travel opportunities to experience things that may be out of “my comfort zone.”  I believe we should all try to keep our minds open and learn new things no matter how “old” we become. Learning how to operate a computer helped me in my working life as well as my personal life. I didn’t come to computers and the internet till later in my life, but I’m glad I learned how. How would I communicate so well with all of you without that skill?

When you are young, you are sometimes told “you are too young to do that.” Now that I am supposedly classified as “old,” and can make my own choices, my body tells me “you’re too old to do that.” I don’t feel old at age 70 next week. Although my body doesn’t always agree with me, in my mind at least, I am still that 16-year-old girl driving around the rotary in the old DeSoto with her friends on a Friday night.

Keep learning everyone and thanks for listening.

Love Poem Contest - for Friday, February 25

Here's today's Love Poem for you:

She Walks In Beauty
By George Gordon Lord Byron

She walks in Beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which Heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express,
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

____________________________________

And here's a bonus poem:

A Red, Red, Rose

O, my love is like a red, red rose,
That is newly sprung in June.
O, my love is like the melody,
That is sweetly played in tune.

As fair are you, my lovely lass,
So deep in love am I,
And I will love you still, my Dear,
Till all the seas go dry.

Till all the seas go dry, my Dear,
And the rocks melt with the sun!
O I will love you still, my Dear,
While the sands of life shall run.

And fare you well, my only Love,
And fare you well a while!
And I will come again, my Love,
Although it were ten thousand mile!

- Robert Burns –

Where do these quotes come from?

10. 

We all want to fall in love. Why?
Because that experience makes us feel completely alive,
where every sense is heightened,
and every emotion is magnified.
Our everyday reality is shattered
and we are flung into the heavens.
It may only last a moment, an hour, or an afternoon,
but that doesn't diminish its value,
because we are left with memories
that we treasure for the rest of our lives.

11.

What therefore God has joined together,
let no man separate.

12.


Grow old along with me
the best is yet to be.

13.


Who knows where the road will lead us
Only a fool would say,
But if you let me love you
I'm sure to love you all the way.

This contest closes today. Email me at southendstories@aol.com with your answers to all 13 quotes. Please put them in the form of a list 1 through 13. If you don't know one, leave it blank. The first person who sends me the most correct answers wins a special prize. I'll accept your answers starting right now til Monday, Feb. 28 at 5:00 pm. Good luck.

More Fun in the Snow

These pictures were posted on FB by my great-niece, Danielle recently. They are all family members for the most part.

This is the family of my nephew, Steve. 

The baby in the pink jacket is my great-great-niece, Alison Sylvester

There are a  couple I don't recognize, so they are probably not Sylvesters.

Niece, Danielle with boyfriend.

Alison

Grampa Steve and Alison

Oops

Mom, Linda, and Alison

Gramp and Alison

Dad Jake, Alison, Mom Linda

Mom and Alison go it again.

The Lost Art of Letter Writing

Why don’t we write letters anymore? Is it the convenience of email; a matter of not paying for stamps; time issues; or have we just forgotten how? Letter writing is an art to some. The letters you see at the end of this blog fall into that category. The only letters I write now are usually thank-you notes, which I feel should be hand written as a courtesy, even though my arthritic hands don’t always agree.

I save any and all letters, thank-you notes, Christmas letters, or whatever personal mail I get and have for years. I have one box stuffed with them. I had more, but some have gotten lost in the many moves I’ve made since leaving home.

My intention is to use them in some way as a part or whole of some future book or story. To that end I began going through them last night to see what I could discover. Some of these letters go back to the early 60s and I have just scratched the surface. I think as I get deeper into the box I may find even older ones.

Some of the things I discovered as I glanced over some of these letters, cards, and other notes brought back many memories.

The most letters I ever received, I got from my mother, Evangeline. I think of her writing these letters in her distinctive handwriting style which uses the old cursive “r” and I thank her. Her whole life, since I was old enough to receive letters from her, were in there. I saw her handwriting change as the years went on. I can see where her hand shakes in her later years.

These letters show me the transitions that took place in my parents’ lives. From the years when they were taking care of us kids; to their retirement; to the years spent at the cottage in Spruce Head; the moves after selling the cottages to apartment living; and finally to my mother’s apartment at the Methodist Home.

Her letters tell of her busy life while I was away at college. There are many money concerns in them as well as her concern for me and my welfare. Many of those letters held checks or cash to get me by for a while. When I was at college in Machias, she would send me 2 or 3 dollars. That would keep me in treats at Helen’s Restaurant and activities at school. She would mention other expenses she had and the prices she paid for things, which are laughable today. She decided one year that perhaps she’d cut her Christmas card list when the stamps went up to 22 cents.

Many of the letters I received from home contained newspaper clippings. I have run into several pieces of my brother’s old column in the Bangor Daily News, which was called “Fish and Chips.” There are also obituaries of people I knew in the South End. I found a story about my father about his volunteer work at the hospital at age 80 in which he was quoted as saying, “The best thing I ever did was marry her” (telling about his marriage of 56 years at that time). He also said, “The most important thing in life is to raise good citizens.” He thought he’d achieved that goal quite well. What a thing to run into as I read and reminisced about my father.

I suspect as I dig deeper I will find many more treasures like this. I figure I’ll end up with enough clippings to make a family scrapbook, which I will probably do at some point.

The most heart-warming letters I have kept belong to those who are no longer with us, like my Grandmother, Ida Tolman. She always made a present for each of us in the family every year, even if it was just a crocheted snowflake to hang on our Christmas tree. She was an accomplished seamstress and crafter. If you gave her a few shells and some rocks, she’d make some kind of animal out of it for you. Her letters to me were mostly thank-yous for Christmas gifts I gave her; but she always added a few things about what was happening in her small world up there in Rockville. She was not able to get out very much because of a medical condition; so she would sit in her chair by the window and watch her birds outside and enjoy her many indoor plants. She’d tell you about everyone who visited her and about her love of nature.

I also treasure the few letters I ever received from my brother, Harlan, in his left-handed scrawl. He was a man of few words, but once in a while he’d send me a few lines about his life.

Other letters I’ve come across came from old friends I’ve met in one school or another which I attended, as well as friends from Methodist Church Camp, or Mechawana, as it is lovingly called. I attended this camp in Winthrop, Maine for many years. Many of us planned to come at the same time, therefore making lasting friendships possible. I ran into many of these same kids at college believe it or not. One of those friends I have corresponded with in one way or another for close to 50 years.

The funny thing about these old letters from friends is that they sometimes talk about people I can’t remember and I have no idea what they are talking about. So many people come in and out of our lives that sometimes the only places they still exist are in these letters. If I dig far enough I will probably find love letters from a guy name Rodney, who was my boyfriend at Mechawana. Last I heard he was having heart trouble. I hope he is still alive and well.

The next time you begin to write an email to someone you love, think about it. Wouldn’t it be better if they had something they could touch and feel and knew that you actually took the time to sit down and write them a few lines? I promise you that if you ever sent me a letter in the last 30 years or so, I still have it and treasure it.

Speaking of love letters, please enjoy these love letters written by famous people to the loves of their lives.

Thanks for listening.

To Fanny Brawne:
I cannot exist without you - I am forgetful of
every thing but seeing you again - my life seems
to stop there - I see no further. You have
absorb'd me.

I have a sensation at the present moment as though
I were dissolving ....I have been astonished that
men could die martyrs for religion - I have
shudder'd at it - I shudder no more - I could be
martyr'd for my religion - love is my religion - I
could die for that - I could die for you. My creed
is love and you are its only tenet - you have
ravish'd me away by a power I cannot resist.
John Keats

John Keats (1795 - 1821) led a short but brilliant
life. At the age of 23 he met and fell in love
with Fanny Brawne, literally the girl next door.
Tragically, doctors had already diagnosed the
tuberculosis which would eventually kill him, so
their marriage became an impossibility.

Henry VIII (1528)

To Anne Boleyn

My Mistress and Friend,
I and my heart put ourselves in your hands,
begging you to recommend us to your good grace and
not to let absence lessen your affection...or
myself the pang of absence is already to great,
and when I think of the increase of what I must
needs suffer it would be well nigh intolerable but
for my firm hope of your unchangeable affection...

Henry VIII (1528)

August 15, 1846

I will cover you with love when next I see you,
with caresses, with
ecstasy. I want to gorge yu with all the joys of
the flesh, so that
you faint and die. I want you to be amazed by me,
and to confess to
yourself that you had never even dreamed of such
transports... When
you are old, I want you to recall those few hours,
I want your dry
bones to quiver with joy when you think of
them.

Gustave Flaubert, famous French writer, to his wife Louise Colet.

August 1, 1810

Oh My William! it is not in my power to tell thee
how I have been
affected by this dearest of all letters - it was
so unexpected - so
new a thing to see the breathing of thy inmost
heart upon paper that I
was quite overpowered, & now that I sit down to
answer thee in the
lonliness & depth of that love which unites us &
which cannot be felt
but by ourselves, I am so agitated & my eyes are
so bedimmed that I
scarely know how to proceed...

Written by Mary Wordsworth to her husband William
Wordsworth.William of course is a well known
English Poet.