1) When I talked to Mama and Daddy on the phone, they had been to the cemetery to put flowers on graves. Rusty recently sent me a picture of Tacky's grave, so I am including a photo for those who haven't been to Whitehouse lately.2) I did go to the library bag sale and picked up a bunch of hardback histories and biographies, mainly for Tom. I still didn't find anything that appealed to me that much, even at the "Take A Bag or A Box Full for a Free Will Donation" price. I was almost home when suddenly an alarm went off in the car. I had put the bag on the passenger's seat and when I made a turn, the weight shifted in such a way that the Vibe decided someone was sitting there without a seat belt buckled. Scared me for a moment, but there were no flashing red lights or grinding gears...
3) Speaking of the Vibe and my aging, yesterday someone drove by in a classic car and for some reason it made me think of Pontiacs. You know, that great old hood ornament! Anyway, my half awake brain got to wondering if they still make Pontiacs. Then it dawned on me: I was driving a Pontiac Vibe even as I wondered. And I thought I was going to have to take care of Mama and Daddy when they start to lose it!4) Gasoline hit $3.359 here yesterday. I suppose the predicted $4.00 a gallon will come true this summer. Of course, everything is so much more expensive than when I was a kid and dinosaurs roamed the earth. Gasoline wars sometimes put it in the lower twenty-cent range. Cigarettes were thirty-five cents instead of three bucks a pack. The summer Ted and Cynthia got married, I shared a house with Steve Yarbrough, David Lejeune and Other David. Total rent and utilities was $100 and we each had a private room -- such as it was. This is the house that Daddy wouldn't let Mama go inside. Of course, I was working at the bookstore probably still for $1.00 an hour... Mama tells me that the 4+ acres on Southwood Drive in Huntsville that Daddy bought for $450 back in 1956 is now for sale at an asking price of $100,000. Good grief! And that's without a house on it!
5) More birthday related news:
a. Tom's son John graduated from St. John's College in Santa Fe and the crowd called me afterwards to sing Happy Birthday. John's senior essay was "A Glimpse of Heaven: On Love and Humility in the Phaedrus". Yes, it's that kind of school.
b. And I got an email from my Carmelite buddy in Nairobi, Steve Payne: Happy birthday, old man. It's consoling to know I'm still a youthful 56. I confess to being a little slow with the congratulations. Today was graduation day for the Institute of Spirituality and Religious Formation at Tangaza, the first at which I had to perform as Director. It went well enough, but as is always the case at African events, everyone has to give a speech, everything has to be sung or danced. So right now I'm exhausted. (Here there was a big debate over whether the ISRF students, who are only getting diplomas, should wear caps as well as the gowns. The lifers here insisted that the hats are only appropriate for degrees. I told them it didn't make a big difference to me one way or the other, because I've been to nursery school "graduations" in the US where the kids are wearing cap and gowns!)
c. More phone calls: Fr. Joe Wolf, one of my other Iowa friends, called and in the middle of that call, Kristin/Nike called. She wished me a happy 700th birthday and said she remembers when I was young. Who needs nieces, anyway?
d. Just got another e-card, this one from Ted reminding me I am only three away from the big 6-0. And who needs little brothers, either?
