Two Days and Many Years Away

[captainsblog]

I rolled back in at just about this time last night. Most of those 24 have been spent catching up on the home front, sleeping, catching up on the work front, sleeping some more, and, finally, catching up on the cyber front.

The raisin-day-entree for this whole absence was for me to begin preparation with a client for a trial scheduled to begin a week from Monday. He'll be away next weekend, so it made sense to go out to his shop, about a 450 mile trip, to review the documents and other stuff. Making it all the more sensible was the fact that one of my nieces lives not far from there, and I had a lovely time with her, her husband and their cat, beginning Thursday night and again before hitting the road for the client yesterday morning.

Nicole and I each have milestones surrounding her mom. I'm about to turn 49, the final birthday her mother lived to see. She, in turn, just turned 35, the age Sandy was when she had her. There were no literal ghosts in the house (although I did bring along a bottle of wine from one of our favorite Cayuga Lake wineries, bearing the name "Apparition," in honor of a ghost supposedly haunting a barn they recently moved to the winery grounds). Nonetheless, when two or more of Sandy's relatives are gathered, she is far more emotionally present among them.

In this case, in the oddest of ways. Nicole's stepmother has been clearing her childhood home of many of the older memories of her dad, who we lost last November a day before his 70th (and my 48th) birthday. Fortunately, she's made sure that Nicole, especially, has had the chance to claim these treasures, however strange they might be. "You won't believe what she found," she said to me, bringing a small wooden box to her dining room table.  Instantly, I knew, and believed:



That, beloveds, is a music box- a creature of its times, from early in the late 60s marriage of Nicole's dad and my sister. Turn its crank, and push the button on its side, and to the tune of Smoke Gets In Your Eyes, it dispensed, yes,.... cigarettes.  I can't find any reference to such a beast on eBay, and it looks handmade, so I am seriously considering the possiblity that her father made it by his own hand, with touches of both woodworking and irony-working that would have been quintessentially Jean-Pierre.

We're trying to puzzle out a new use for the box, since blessedly, nobody in our family smokes. Smarties are too thick for the ciggie holes, DumDums are too tall. Emily suggested candy cigarettes, but that just seems cheap.

I stayed in a guest bedroom that just exuded our family. Pictures of her father, my mother, and other memories of the lives that led us on the starts of our lives. They haven't quite turned out as they might have been planned, but they've been full of love, and laughs, and even occasional adventures, and I, for one, wouldn't try to stop the music box from playing the song it has- toxic substances and all.

----

It occurred to me, sometime on my drive back Friday, that I'd missed another occasion in all of this. Twenty-four years and (then) twenty-four hours ago, one of my favorite correspondents here came into this world. She keeps busier than many I know of twice her age, and I never fail to smile when I see her words, or her smiling face, or the good she does in this life. Happy belated, thatyousay:)

Comments

[headbanger118.livejournal.com]

Would lollipop stems fit in it?

What a beautiful treasure, and it does look hand-made. Of course the value of it in the really important ways is immeasurable. Thanks for a glimpse into your wonderful and always interesting family. :D