May Memories
- May Processions and May queens at our Catholic school, Our Lady of Lourdes
- My mother would open the back door and the first whiff of lilacs would jump on me.
- May 9, 1954- my brother, Jim, is born
- May 2, 1998- my mother asked me to get her a mother’s day gift for Cindy, her new daughter-in-law. Cindy is giving birth in July to her first child. “Let me offer you what will probably be my first and last bit of advice on childbirth”, my mother says, “When they offer you drugs before the delivery, take it. Don’t be a hero. Take everything they offer you because they aren’t going to offer it a second time.”
- May 9,1998- my mother dies after a four-year battle with cancer.
- First the lilac bloom and then the butterflies return to my yard.
- Post Prom Parties- As a high school principal, I spent many evenings in the gym, watching Post Prom Night unfold. Parents spent thousands of dollars on prom night to keep their kids safe. Then, two weeks later, after graduation, they give them the keys to the car and the beach house where a group of 18 year olds spend the week drinking, smoking pot and have lots of sex. I guess the grief of losing a child is greater if s/he doesn't make it to high school graduation.
- 2006- walking up on the beach on Assetegeaue Island, watching the sun come up and wild horses gazing on in the distance.
- 1963- my grandfather has a massive heart attack on our front porch. I was 7 and I remember feeling so helpless.
- Memorial Weekend- piles and piles of horseshoe crabs would gather around the bulkhead, in the bay, right outside our back yard on Long Beach Island. My brother would grab one by the tail and 4 or 5 other crabs would be locked tight together.
2018- I saw Paula Poundstone at the Grand Opera House in DE.
- 1981- I earned my MEd from Penn State University
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