I've Been Missing in Action

I've been either busy with lots of overtime at work (60+ hrs/week) combined with a lot of "catching up" because I've missed a bunch of days due to being sick - or being totally "out of commission" being sick.

I did get out some these past couple weekends. I got to the Howell Living History Farm near my Mom's place and enjoyed a hayride. I posted some photos and videos in Flickr if you want to see them. Since my dad died, the Howell Farm has become a refuge - and a place to step back in time. When I enter the property - it is like stepping back 100 years - and time slows... and things ... feel relaxed and ... safe (no flying missiles - nobody blowing themselves up - no tweets - no inanity)

The sense of calmness is much needed.

Seeing a 1907 Case Steam powered tractor takes one back in time too! This one was bringing Santa Claus and his wife to the farmhouse.


After the farm visit, I went to another farm, Paxson Hill Farm, where I could visit the Peacocks...

I finally got around to sending out some Christmas cards this past week. Maybe I'm catching up after all?

The team of oxen carted wood used by the steam tractor.

Memorial Day 2017

My Dad served as a Captain in the US Army. He was never under enemy fire, something for which his family is very grateful.

I heard these words today. They resonate today, like they did on Veteran's Day, 1985.

"{W}hen a serviceman dies, it's a tear in the fabric, a break in the whole, and all we can do is remember.

It is, in a way, an odd thing to honor those who died in defense of our country, in defense of us, in wars far away. The imagination plays a trick. We see these soldiers in our mind as old and wise. We see them as something like the Founding Fathers, grave and gray haired. But most of them were boys when they died, and they gave up two lives -- the one they were living and the one they would have lived. When they died, they gave up their chance to be husbands and fathers and grandfathers. They gave up their chance to be revered old men. They gave up everything for our country, for us. And all we can do is remember.

And the living have a responsibility to remember the conditions that led to the wars in which our heroes died. Perhaps we can start by remembering this: that all of those who died for us and our country were, in one way or another, victims of a peace process that failed...

We're surrounded today by the dead of our wars. We owe them a debt we can never repay. All we can do is remember them and what they did and why they had to be brave for us...

In memory of those who gave the last full measure of devotion, may our efforts to achieve lasting peace gain strength...

God bless America." - Remembering those who paid for our freedom.

Photos from January

I've been really busy and have been missing blogging mojo - I'd say more about these photos that were taken late December and early January but I've got to scoot... Hope to post more soon.

A cherry tree in bloom in January - a warms spell got it royally confused!

The aftermath of Super Storm Sanday (2012) linger on...

Santa waves from the porch in a house that was recently raised.

Beautiful Dolphin sculpture.

Another house being raised. This one is actually sitting in the street while they dig the new foundation.

Winter Beach - my favorite time down the shore.

My Dad's dog Zoey makes herself at home.

The place down the shore. I need to do some exterior painting.

The Morris Arboretum was brown and dull - It has exploded with Spring flowering now. I got to get there and take some photos of the blooming trees.

My older brother and his family spent a week in Myrtle Beach.

A South Carolina snowman.

The Myrtle Beach lighthouse.

While he was on the beach in South Carolina, I was on the beach in New Jersey.

New Jersey beach.

My family memories at the beach photo collage. Over 110 individual photos are mounted in the "room divider".

Holiday Scenes

A short video of the Garden Train at the Morris Aboretum.

A pretty barn near Peace Valley Nature Center

A decoration at the old office

Happy Birthday Dad!

Over the Thanksgiving Day holiday, my older brother and I were out for a walk on the Delaware Canal towpath - it was a very nice late autumn day. The sun shone brightly against the white bark of the Sycamores.

My brother and I got to talking about a Thanksgiving a couple years ago, when my father was very ill and spent the holiday in the hospital, coming home only to have dinner with us on Thanksgiving day. We added up all the "life-threatening" moments he has had in the past few years - since his quintuple bypass surgery - and the tally stood at once every other year - for well over a decade.

This year, Dad celebrated his 80-th birthday with a trip to the Kidney Doctor, where he was told to go on a very low potassium diet. He being diabetic, he can actually eat very little as it is - and now it is even less. But...

On a dreary day, he and my mom were surprised by their Church and they had a nice celebration with folks that care about him (and good folks that they care about in return). He got some funny cards, some small gifts and a huge cake! Mom and I looked the other way while he enjoyed a small bit topped with creamy, sugary icing.

Happy Birthday Dad! Keep plugging away!

Mother's Day and Graduations

Last weekend, I went to upstate (Rochester) NY to attend my nephew's graduation. It is a 7 hour drive one-way, so the ride is rather tiring. I took my parents up. My oldest nephew graduated on Sunday morning - the ceremony was held in the minor league ice hockey team's building downtown.

I never actually saw the college campus (Nazareth University). The younger nephew graduates this upcoming Saturday (Niagara College near Buffalo) but his is "limited attendance" (only four tickets), so we just celebrated his "while we were there" and of course we celebrated Mother's Day too! It was a party-harty weekend!

The weather was sunny - actually it was hot and sticky and in the 90s. Surprising for Rochester at this time of year (their daffodils just bloomed last week!) I would visit them more often - but 14 hours of driving for a weekend doesn't work out so well!

The stage was within easy view.

My nephew was not quite lost in the crowd. I see him in there!


The big moment - two hours into the ceremony.

Outside in the nice sunshine with a gentle cooling breeze, the nephews are besieged with photo op requests.

Let's cram twenty people into the dinning room!

The cake was a work of art - I told my mom, the best thing about all this - is seeing my nephews smiling and happy. She replied, "That might be the best (grand)mother's day gift a mom could ever get.

Christmas is Coming

Barely finished with Thanksgiving, I find myself getting Christmas Cards and even boxes in the mail. Before I moved on from Thanksgiving, I wanted to share a photo of my Uncle Jim and Aunt Mary. I found one at my parent's house. In the guest bedroom, my mom keeps a display of family photos that I have found in a variety of old boxes in the attic and other places.

My Uncle Jim and Aunt Mary are in the center. James Joseph Dunn Jr. was a Master Sargent in the Army and was stationed in Germany immediately after WWII. He looks so impossibly young in this photo. Of course, I never saw him as a "young man"!

In the week that follows Thanksgiving, I place grave blankets on my Grandparent's grave - It is my way of telling them I am thankful for all the love and blessings they gave me while they were "with us." They have not been forgotten - and with the onset of their favorite time of the year, They are specially remembered.

My mother's father loved Fruitcake from Collin Street Bakery of Texas - and a can of it was ordered for the family to share on Christmas Day.

My dad's mom loved to sign her gifts "From Santa" and spent the entire year before Christmas looking (and listening) for the perfect gift idea. She always found something that made her grandchild jump up and down in glee.

The recent loss of my dad's father is becoming less recent - but the later years on the gravestone remind me that my dad's father's last Christmas with us was no different - my older brother and I shared a few hours with him in his comfortable bedroom on Christmas Day. As confused as he was with many things, he knew it was Christmas - and that "Kid" (as he called his wife) was greatly missed...and especially so on that day.

And now, I will start writing and send my own Christmas Cards.

Thanksgiving Weekend

This Thanksgiving, I went down to the seashore with my parents. I always enjoy the "winter beach" and the lack of crowds during the off-season. We left just before a Nor'easter storm left 4 or 5 inches of snow in my neighborhood and I only saw only some cold wet rain as the snow was gone by the time I returned home.

I did some overdue maintenance work on a garden shed, Superstorm Sandy had blown off some roof shingles and I set about cleaning out the shed and mending the roof. After getting the shed in order, I went down to the beach to listen to the surf. I took a half dozen photos, and I like how the seagull in the foreground might look like he made some footprints.

About a month ago, I was rooting through some old boxes with stuff my Grandfather left behind, and in with the "debris" of a long life (i.e., "trash") I found a family heirloom.

A silver plated carving set. I was immediately transported back 40-45 years in time to a Thanksgiving Dinner at my grandparents, parents, brothers, and my Uncle Jim, Aunt Mary, and their son Paddy. My grandmother had spent the day setting the big table in her dinning room, and now we all sat down to give thanks and to eat a feast fit for kings. My Uncle Jim, in his booming voice filled with laughter, saying, "Well, Harry! Bring on the bird!!"

My grandfather would then bring the huge (usually a 25 pound plus) turkey from the kitchen through the swinging door to the end of the long table. He would then make a few swipes of the carving knife on the sharpener (it really didn't need it, as my grandfather had fully sharpened it an hour or two beforehand) and set about carving white meat for those that wanted white meat and dark meat for those that wanted dark meat, and always gave me and my younger brother a drumstick apiece too.

This Thanksgiving, my parents and I ate a much smaller turkey carved with the carving set my great-grandfather first used in the 1920's. You might notice someone got a drumstick.

We talked about the many delicious meals we shared with my Uncle Jim, Aunt Mary and Paddy, and how much we always enjoyed being with them. It was hard to believe it has been over 30 years now since we last ate with him.

And as fate would have it, hungry for something warm after a cold day spent outside, we ran short of mashed potatoes, which reminded us of the time my grandmother spent hours peeling and boiling potatoes and mashed them by hand only to find the heaping bowl full only went 2/3ds of the way around the table! She was visibly mortified - and no amount of telling her, "there was more than ample food to make up for it," would make her less embarrassed. Through the hub-bub, my cousin Paddy* pipes up, "Boy these mashed potatoes sure are good!" It turns out that he had innocently taken half the bowl, so Aunt Mary rescued some of them and we all had some mashed potatoes after all!

*Cousin Paddy, James J. Dunn the III had Down's Syndrome and was a big, gruff, but wonderfully big-hearted soul. He spent many hours setting up his huge HO train set and tracks so that his cousins (my brothers and I) would be able to play with them when we came to visit him.

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday

Been very busy. Trying to catch up.

My older brother came to down for Memorial Day. He and I walked down the Delaware Canal towpath before and after stuffing ourselves with "holiday food." The goose family came by to honk at us.

The houseboat is in the water and (mostly) ready for a summer season of fun. I have to work next Saturday though.

After walking 8 miles just to get things from storage and into the houseboat, I enjoyed the serenity of a quiet sunset.

Christmas 2013

The dates were finally put on the my grandfather's gravestone this year. I can't describe how I feel - it makes things... feel so "final" somehow.

When I placed the grave blankets on my grandparent's graves this year, I spent some time recalling the many Christmases past that my grandparents and aunts and uncles came to visit - and so many of the wonderful memories.

My grandfather on the last Christmas he enjoyed opening presents.

My grandmother with her younger sister, the Mayor of Chula Vista, California and her husband, visiting Lawrence Welk. Mr. Welk was one of my grandmother's most favorite musicians. She loved singing "Toyland, Toyland" and I learned to play it on the piano for her.

My grandfather with his three sisters - My aunts Harry, Johanna Parker, Mary Dunn, and Marian Hawn (my Dad, Robert, is in the chair behind them). Ross Hawn Jr. is the smiling face between the legs. Palmyra, New Jersey circa 1945. Ross Sr., Marian's husband, probably took the photograph.

My mom's mom. I love this photograph, murky as it is, because it shows her shoveling snow out to the clothesline in Milton Mills, New Hampshire. She suffered several strokes while I was young and most of my memories of her are her in a nursing home - unable to remember anyone's name, including her own.

My mom's dad hold my mom on the edge of the ocean - He was a loving but "set in his ways" man - He was the only one of the four grandparents I was with when he died. His heart failed while he was in a snoozing nap - and his end was a peaceful one. It was so hard to envision this man being born in "Indian Territory" (now Oklahoma), serving as a telegraph operator in the Navy during WWI, and retiring to a farmhouse in New Hampshire - miles from the "City". I have since learned some of his story in my quest to get my mom's Daughters of the American Revolution membership.

One of the stories tickles me pink - He was one of 5 strapping young men in his family, they all ran to 6 foot and several inches tall - but it was his mother that they all called for when they spotted a rattlesnake. They would cry, "Momma! Momma! Come quick, there is a snake here!" and the little pioneer woman, she was only 4 foot 8, would rush to their side with a hoe and dispatch the snake for them.

For many years, no matter how much snow was on the roads - these people would somehow find their way to my boyhood home early Christmas Day - and made Christmas... Christmas for three little, much loved, boys.