1. On Friday (Good Friday), Mary and I got up very early and drove the 300+ miles to a little town in Eastern Iowa. It took longer than the 4 hours she had planned--5 and a half hours--even with "shortcuts." There was, compared to East Coast driving, almost no traffic, and the weather was clear and beautiful. We were on our way to meet with my son, Tom, who still lives and works there, and Mary's oldest sister and her husband, who were driving over from Chicago, and two of my dear old friends from Iowa City, who were driving up. We were all to meet "at the bank," of which there used
only one, back in the day. My son now tells me there are more--maybe four or five? We were supposed to meet at 12N, but of course, Mary and I were an hour and a half late. Try killing that much time on the main street of a small town in a bank.
With the delay, my son and Iowa City friends moved to a small cafe within eyesight of the bank,
and when Mary and I parked and called, we discovered we were right in front of the cafe. Bingo! My oldest niece and her husband had taken the extra time to sneak into the Big Town down the highway to buy some oil-based housepaint, which apparently cannot be had in Chicago, but the others were there--relieved/exasperated/starving, and we gave the friendly waiter our orders that appeared in about 10 minutes. Slow customers, fast food. After lunch, we walked the very short distance to our
former dwelling and inspected the town sliding hill, which ran down the street in front of the house,
the new garage out back, the cherry tree by the alley--all the important sites. The house of our dear late neighbor, Mrs. B., has been converted to an antique store. They had a big bowl of Scrabble tiles for sale--5 for 25c--which the Chicago folks thought was outrageous.
The main street is much more varied than it used to be: at least two women's clothing stores--instead of just one. two or three cafes instead of just one (and that doesn't count what's on the other side). Tom has worked for the biggest grocery store since he was 14 years old and bagged groceries after school. He was gone for 5 years when he was in the Navy, and now he's back. He loves the place, has wonderful friends there. He's a friendly, laid back kind of guy (if we're worried about something, his response is "no problem"), and knows just about everyone he meets there by name.
On the way back to Minneapolis that, I took a photo of the moon rising over Iowa. I can't figure out how to get it away from my iPad, as my Apple "keepsake" won't connect to anything significant other than email. Like the Cloud, for example. The software is irreparably unupgradable. Uff da. Nice photo, though. This was the same moon that caused the partial solar eclipse the next morning. (Wait for it).
On Saturday, more kin arrived to say hello: Mary's sister Cindy, brother Bob's daughter Fran, brother John's sons Paul and John (and John's two young daughters), Mary and Cindy's sister Paula, who prepared a lovely buffet, Paula's son Elliot and his wife, Annie. Who else? Delaney was working, Alan was playing his weekly Saturday am basketball game with his cronies.
After the visitors left, Mary and I went for a walk to the local creek/pond, and the trees (including paper birch) and birds (cardinals, red-wing blackbirds) and ducks (mallards) were enchanting. I'd
forgotten just how incredibly beautiful it is.
Before supper, Alan played his banjo as he does every Saturday night while the steak grills. The first song is always the same, the second one he dedicates to Mary, and then he plays various songs that he's downloaded from the internet or from what I know as the Quaker Song Book, which has everything: folk songs from all over, hymns, spirituals, you name it, that book probably has it. Mary
picked up her guitar and sang along in her lovely, clear voice. When it was time to eat, they lit candles and shared the steak and salad. Wonderful!
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