NorEaster

Well, I guess alot of the country is in for bad weather.   I look at the newscasts of the heavy snows hitting across the midwest & eastern seaboard, it takes me back to the winter of 1969 in a suburb of Chicago.

Boy, we got hit with a storm to end all storms...29" of snow...combined with the terrific wind that Chicago is noted for.....I could touch the snow from the second floor of my townhouse.  My whole front yard, front door were totally inaccessible.  Luckily, we had a back door (no pun intended) so we walked or climbed around the block and shoveled our way to the front door.

I wish I had a scanner, I have a picture of my little two year (Kenji) standing on the path that we had just shoveled....he's all bundled up in a heavy blue snow suit, the sides of the walk way formed almost an igloo type of cave....that towers above him and drawfs him totally.

I could never understand why the city of Chicago always had their fire hydrants super tall above the sidewalk..I used to think, are they trying to tell the dogs something?..that year I found out why....that bad storm hit in December or January .... it never melted, we never saw the sidewalk again until April! 

I loved the snow though...I wish I was up in New York now..just to play.  Besides there is something magical about the city's view after a really heavy snow storm....it glistens, it glows, it refreshes the air and quiets the city's soul for a little while.

Just stay warm people......and safe..... 

Homework Assignment...Parties that Bombed

No my little one's two year old birthday party was successful, just figured I'd use a party picture.

Little did I know that I would actually years later become a "Party Planner" yikes.

Well,  I've had some strange experiences with clients, one in particular comes to mind. I'm not going to  publish the person's name, just let it be said that he is involved in a major league sport.

This person had just built a $5,000,000.00 home in our area..it had everything...a man-made lagoon pool,a bath changing area, a long dock with a boat ramp, an outside bar area, a heated four car garage, wide open green spaces to be able to party on, bedrooms galore, a game room to die for - everything that you can possibly imagine it it...a child's delight, a large lanai with inside bar....everything made with beautiful shades of marble.

Well, of course, he's going to throw a grand opening for the house. My employer and myself toured the grounds making plans for the party.  This particular gentlemen had a New York publicist that wanted to plan the entire party long distance...well, we all know how good that works!  She wanted white heated tents, comfortable furniture....tables and chairs everywhere.  We proceeded to order and prepare everything from flowers to the gourmet foods requested.

We were informed that 500 individual invitations had gone out...so we planned for around 700.......this woman mailed out over 1,000 invitations without telling us the correct number.  You got it...fiasco!!   Not enough room, not enough food, not enough security....with that much going on...all the young kids in the neighborhood tried sneaking in over the gates. Oh, I forgot to mention that she had also wanted huge spotlights shinning over the mansion to attract more attention.   It was too much for the security force that was in place.

I felt bad...I knew the owner did not want a riot at all and it was not what he had envisioned.  Luckily, they had brought in some really good musicians so people were kind of chillin to the beat and it didn't turn ugly.    Of course, they also ordered alot of pizza!

That's my sorry story.......Sandi

 

Kinda Mad

Well, if life is full of surprises...this is one that I really didn't expect.  I've visited other message boards, especially because I delved into family genealogy.  I used to look at the various threads and thank God that my AOL message boards were NOT set up that way!  I thought how confusing, it's hard to follow...breaks your train of thought and makes it difficult to have a feeling of interaction between the writers.

It's not that I haven't tried...I joined two groups here on AOL and tried to interact on their own boards...but again, the continuity isn't there, it's not fluid...it stalls, it detracts from the messages.  Maybe someone has come up with the idea that all this interaction between us is not a good thing?

Also is this why AOL caved in about letting us have our "own board"...J-land Cafe?  Knowing that they were to change the entire scenario?

Does this particular format save AOL money?  What exactly are the benefits to it?  That is what I would of liked to have read in the AOL annoucement....some reason as to why.

I really would like to know how many people dislike this format.

Thinking Back

Looking back and trying to remember what the feelings were during the 1960's....it was a time to celebrate youth and believe that you were invincible..to be 17 again.

I like to think that I grew up without prejudice..although it was all around me - I took no notice of the slights & wrongs that were done to people of color.  Not until the riots, not until the marches and not until Dr. King's words rang from the hallowed halls of our cherished monuments.....did my eyes open and see the injustice of our world.

As a young child visiting my southern Grandmother in Virginia I could not understand why I could not sit at the back of the bus...like I did in New York.  It was the best place to enjoy the ride, especially hitting bumps...in New York I always ran for the back.  Well, it was just too much for a nine year old to fathom and I remember saying to my Grandma..."But why can't I do that?" She told me that there was a line that you did not cross...I took it literally and looked for a line on the floor of the bus.....seeing none....I told her "There's no line!"  Now Grandma was born in South Carolina and raised by a black Mammy, she had alot of respect for the black folk as she called them.  While they lived in Norfolk my Grandma had a black lady, named Maybelle,who helped clean house, ironed etc., who I loved as much as any member of  my family.  She was a constant in my life for so many years.  They were all getting up in age and Maybelle had to stop working, but every so often she would come for a visit.....when my Grandpa died I remember Maybelle and her whole extended family came to pay their respects at the Greek Church...it was a wonderful gesture that my Grandma treasured.

I am very glad that there was a Dr. King and that he was able to bring his people the freedom that he spoke so eloquently about.  It's a shame that it took all these years.

 

Time Flies When You Are Having Fun

Well, it's hard to believe that I'm back home again.  Did you ever look forward to something so much and find that the moments leading up to it move as slow as molasses in January....but when you are right in the middle of the moment time is "flying" as if the second hand on the clock had a life of it's own...speeding...faster and faster.

I enjoyed the children so much.  Each age has it's own joy...the oldest girl at age seven is oh, so grown up..and proud of her accomplishments...very good at schoolwork, is writing in cursive (in my day we were still printing at age seven!) And her writing is actually beautifully written not a scrawl...but again she has a high amount of artistic talent, it shows in her writing and her artwork.  She's still at that age where you still believe for a short while in Santa Claus, The Easter Bunny & the Tooth Fairy (which will be visiting her shortly)

You cannot play favorites with Grandchildren but the little four year tugs at my heart strings...she's the image of her Mom...I look at her and it takes me back 30 years. There's no moss growing on her either, smart as a whip and very quick on the uptake.  You have to watch what  you say around her and she forgets NOTHING!  I have a little stuffed cute Monkey that has been traveling with me for the last seven years, sleeps in my pocketbook and makes quick friends with little ones.  First thing she asked me was..".Grandma Sandi..Where's the Monkey??" The last time I was up there she was two and had taken my Monkey and dunked in hot chocolate, well she still remembered what she had done to it....so coyly she said to me "I won't drown your Monkey...please can I see it?" She had me laughing.

Oh, lord...The Twins...cute as buttons, just two years old and learning fast from the older sisters....each one of the older girls has "her own" twin. They gravitate towards one another and actually get jealous if the twins switch older sisters. Well, I hadn't seen the babies since they were ten months old so of course they looked at me like I was this crazy lady and when was I leaving.  The first day they both looked at me and when I tried to even talkto them.....they both shook their heads and said a great big NO!!  Well, I kept on working on it, they saw me interacting with the older girls and little by little they warmed up to me.  Then they decided that I was to be called Nanna Sandi not Grandma....my daughter still didn't know where that came from because no one is called Nanna up there.  I'm easy, I don't care what you call me just call me.  Anyway, what really worked was my faithful friend The Monkey!  The twins wanted the Monkey..they would send the four year over to ask if she could play with the Monkey so she could hand it to them!  Little by little the twins would ask me "Monkey sleeping and they would glance towards my pocketbook"...sometimes I told them "Well, right now the Monkey really needs to sleep but we'll get him up in a little while okay?" They would play with the little Monkey and return it to me for it to go back to "sleep".  This all worked well until my last day..couldn't find Monkey...we looked everywhere...so with heavy heart I had to fly home alone.  That night my daughter called me and told me that she had found the Monkey in the magic bed (kid's name for the pullout bed) she said that all of the kids were going to get a box and jointly put the Monkey in to mail to Grandma Sandi.......I actually miss the little fellow.

I had a great time and I wish we lived closer.

I can't believe that it's almost a month since I wrote in this journal.......I'm still playing catch up since I'm back so my writing will be sporactic.......

 

 

Home Is Where The Heart Is

I think I'm going to write in green just in honor of Christmas.... eventually I'll learn to do graphics, when you are older it is one step at a time....patience, patience.   I am so happy....if you could see me I'm doing the "Happy Hampster Dance!!!"

My daughter & her husband sent me plane tickets for the holidays so I can come up and visit the grandbabies.  I haven't seen the twins since they were ten months old....and I didn't even know that they were blondes!  That was a kicker to find out, they never had much hair before and this past summer it just came in like so blonde.  When they were first born I spent a little over a month up there, actually got them to sleep through the night - so that my daughter & son-in-law could cope a little better.  Cause if you look at the other pictures you will see two other little beauties...Brittany & Sabrina added to the mix.....quite a busy household.

I think back and I do have to laugh....my daughter told me when I was expecting my last child (I was an embrassing 40 yrs old at least to a teenager as she was) that SHE was NEVER going to have children EVER...never, never.  Oh, my...how words can can back and bite us!  My daughter is a great Mom though, she works, she cooks, she cleans, she takes charge and she makes things happen.

All things considered, if I had to do it all over...I never would of moved down here.  You know you have those moments in time where you think you know just the right path to take and looking back in retrospect you find you didn't know a damn thing.  Even though I have made so many trips up over the last eight years...I still missed milestones...first steps, first words,first day of school.  I'm in a catch-22 position no way out....Joe would never be able to work up in New York again, not with those terrible cold bone chilling winters.....due to the injuries he suffered from an accident years ago.

If anybody looked at my homepage you know that I love Star Trek..but I really, really wish they could invent a "Beam Me Up, Scotty" machine....it would be instantaneous...I could go "poof" and be in New York. Imagine....I have.....it would be a blow to the airline industry, but the old fashioned way of flying could still be usefull for some things.  I know people will think I'm crazy but 100 years ago they never thought that we would walk on the moon either...oh, wait, we still have people who think we didn't.  Did Columbus have this much of a belief problem?

Anyhow, I am just so happy about going up......it's also hard to pack for 30 degree weather when it's 80 degrees outside!  Oh, I hope it snows when I'm up there...I want to throw a snowball, build a snowman with the babies...throw myself down and make "snow angels"....yes, I am regressing.  I was always the one who loved the cold weather...lived for it, would play in the snow for hours on end, didn't even mind shoveling.  After 18 years down here my blood has thinned, I have allergies galore....and I'll probably freeze my butt off.   But I still think it will be fun!

Homework Assignment

The homework assignment question is "What is your second best character trait?"

I've found throughout my life that people find it very easy to talk to me, even about difficult subjects in their lives.  I always listen with an open mind trying not to judge people.  There have been times where I've been able to really help someone and it feels very good.  I've always believed that good communication between people is so important in our lives.  I'm an Aquarius and definitely a people person...so I think that comes across when I talk to people.

Extra Credit....wish I could tackle projects and not get side-tracked so easily....you know I start one thing and jump to another before the first is done....bad girl!

Sandi