THANKFUL FRIDAY

Michael once asked me what camping trips were like with my dad. When I pull up every camping trip from my memory bank, I see Dad puttering. He was always messing with this or that on the camper or the truck. On our annual fishing trips to Colorado, he’d have us up before the sun. He would be loading the truck up with fishing supplies while we rubbed sleep from our eyes and ate breakfast. After half a day of fishing, we’d come back to the campsite where Dad would unload the truck and start cleaning fish. Then he would get his little grill set up. He would cook fish while Mom would make side dishes. When dinner was finished, we would all help with cleanup, then sit down at the table where we would spend the last of the daylight prepping lines and lures for the next morning. I think I have one photo of Dad sitting in his camp chair enjoying the campfire. It was taken during the summer of my Senior year. Dad made a big deal about that trip and about going to a campground called Fun Valley. The two of us joked the whole time about how fun it was at Fun Valley. He painted ‘Fun Valley’ on one of our campfire logs and gave it to me at the end of that trip.

A few weekends ago, Michael and I went down to my brother’s cabin and set up our camper that we had parked there for the winter. My brother and sister-in-law joined us a day later and we got to spend the weekend together hanging around their cabin. My brother would sit down for a few minutes and then he would be up, puttering around, digging through their shed or moving stone pavers. They had spent the whole week there recently as their vacation and Katrina told me that as soon as my brother got home and sat down in his chair, he fell asleep. I see so much of Dad in my brother Randy. Dad was rarely still. The only times you would see him sitting still would be in the evenings. That is when he would sit down in his worn-out recliner and promptly fall asleep while reading the paper. Unfortunately, after he retired and started up his peanut roasting business, evenings were spent roasting peanuts for the next day. He would get a batch going in his roaster in the garage and then come inside, sit down in his recliner and fall asleep. Dad burned many a batch of peanuts.

Because of our age difference, Randy has often taken on duel rolls of big brother and father figure. I guess that is why I always try to send him something for Father’s Day. Even though I give him a hard time for his choice of ‘news’, he’s still the man in my life that I look up to. He’s still the man in my life who I know will always be there for me. I miss Dad and his ridiculous dad jokes and his constant puttering about. Randy may not have the ridiculous dad jokes, but he’s got the puttering part down. When I see Randy in puttering action, I smile because I see our Dad and then I’ll see Randy do something that is completely and totally Randy.

In that moment, I’ll think to myself how lucky I have been to have them both and how lucky I am to still have my big brother.

ESTER, KIND OF LIKE EASTER

When I was small, on Easter mornings, I'd run to look out the bathroom window. Standing on the toilet and looking out this window gave me a birds eye view of the backyard. This was the best vantage point for spotting any of our brightly colored eggs that the Easter bunny may have hidden in our backyard. Then I'd run down to find my Easter basket. My mother recycled baskets from previous years, but you would not have known this because she always redecorated them with beautiful elaborate bows. Our baskets always contained one new plush bunny rabbit, a chocolate bunny, and some sort of trinket. I'm sure during my Strawberry Shortcake years, that Easter basket contained something Strawberry Shortcake. There were also the usual candies like jelly beans and chocolate eggs in the baskets.

Just about the worst thing ever was running to that bathroom window and seeing that it was raining. I don't know why. Our baskets still had pretty bows and were filled with goodies. Eggs still got hidden. They just got hidden in the living room instead of outside. It's just that hunting eggs in the expanse of my parent's backyard was so much more fun than looking for them under the couch or a lampshade. Sometimes on rainy Easter mornings, the eggs wouldn't be hidden at all. They'd still be crammed in our baskets along with the treats. The sight of my carefully died eggs still in my Easter basket on Easter morning always made my heart sink and mumble something about how the Easter bunny is a jerk. 

Turns out that as an adult, rain is not the worst thing to see out the window on Easter morning. Snow is. Snow. Big wet snow flakes that stick to the cars and form a blanket on the lawn. That has become my new worst. Except, thinking about it now, I realize that if it had snowed on Easter when I was a kid, I would have been over the moon ecstatic. I've gotten cantankerous in my wiser years and cold and snow makes me raise my cane up and shake it at the sky. My cane looks a lot like a camera. By noon, it had all cleared up and the sun came out all in time for Easter services at Terry's which included an egg hunt and the annual burning of the Easter bunny effigy. We ate a lot of egg related food and I still have a half a gallon tub full of deviled egg dip in our fridge. Our fresh eggs looked like we had chewed the shells off, so we just threw it all together in the food processor (minus the shells) with deviled egg spices. Google deviled egg dip. It's totally a thing.  

We all had a grand time at Terry's, even Josephine who got to run with other dogs and be doted on by people other than me or Michael (just me, Michael never dotes), but the whole time I couldn't help but think about Easter's of long ago. I couldn't help but remember the matching Easter dresses or the traditional annual family picture. Most of all, I couldn't help but remember my brother in those baby blue suits, the bell bottoms making him look taller than the sky and how he'd always hide the Easter eggs. As many times as I would ask. That seems to be his way. All I have to do is ask and he's there. I've outgrown the need for him to hide eggs for me. Egg hiding has become things like help us instal a water line or advice on installing a door on the chicken coop. When we talked about installing a new fence around the backyard, he started mentally compiling plans and tools that he'd need. That's the kind of guy he is. 

Today is my brother's birthday. Today is a great day to tell him that I appreciate and love the guy he is. Thanks, Randy for all the hidden Easter eggs and Happy Birthday!