Ralph's Restaurant

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Ralph's Restaurant

Philadelphia, PA

Fall 1995

I am a the hospital, visiting my colleague who is gravely ill.  Her husband and daughter are at her bedside.  I am with another colleague and the moment, though trying, is great fun.  As we are laughing, we notice that Lynn is fading. She needs to rest but she doesn't want us to go as we all live two hours away and it will be another few days before she has any more company.

so we compromise.  we will go to dinner and she will take a nap and then we will check in again before we back the two hour drive back home.

I ask my three friends where they want to go for dinner.  Italian food is the unanimous choice.

"I am going to take you to the best Italian restaurant in Philly", I tell them, filled with self-assuredness.

"You should know a good place", Rich says.  "After all, you're from Philly."

Susan asks for the name of the place.

"I don't know", I confess.

"What, then how are we going to find it?"

"Don't worry.  I'll take care of it,"  unconcerned about this minor detail.  We pile in my car and head to South Philadelphia, home of the Italian market and the heart of the Italian-American neighborhood.  I drive slowly and then I spot an huge, fat man.  I pull over and roll down my window.

"Excuse me, sir," I shout out. "Can you recommend a great restaurant around here?"

He looks up and down the street,  "North or South?"

"What?"

"Northern Italian Cuisine or Southern, which one you like better?"

I shrug my shoulders and shout back, "South?"

"Then you got to go to Ralph's, its right up the street.  It's the best for southern cuisine.  You can't go wrong at Ralph's."

"Great, Thanks," I tell him and roll up my window.

Dick asks, "What's the difference between Northern and Southern cuisines?"

"I don't know," I said.  "I just answered before a food lesson started."

And we do go to ralph's and the food is great and we all leave satisfied with our meal.

Beetle

Beetle

My Back Yard

Carpenter's Point, MD

Summer 2015

Even though he was eating my plant, I was drawn to this beautiful beetle. He sat on that leaf for 20 minutes and I sat on my lawn chair and watched him nibble on the leaf.  And then when he must have been full, he buzzed away, leaving me to feel abandoned.

Starting Young

Starting Young

Jamel, Haiti

Summer 2013  

I always struggle when I see a woman carrying water home to her family.  Rarely do I see a man doing this job;  this is women's work.  They carry 5 gallon buckets on their heads.  That's 40 pounds of weight on their fragile necks. In some parts of the world, this is a full time job for them.  They fetch water seven days a week, every day of the year.  They never take a day off.  They forfeit opportunities to go to school, to learn a skill to support their families.

So when I saw these young girls fetching water, I just wanted to cry.

National Coffee Day

National Coffee Day

WAWA

East Coast, USA

September 29

Nothing derails my day more than National Coffee Day at WAWA, my favorite, favorite convenience store.  The day always creeps up on my and I find myself driving by a store and I see the congestion in the parking lot.  And then I see the free coffee banner. I immediately make an illegal u-turn or reverse too far or go out of my way with a series of left turns to get in to the parking lot.  The crowd makes parking a challenge.  All of us are trying so hard to get in, grab a free cup of coffee and get the hell out. So no one is paying enough attention in the parking lot.

Inside, it's every man for himself.  We all start out with a degree of curtesy but then someone grabs the Half-and-Half just as someone else was grabbing it.  That thoughtlessness is overlooked.  But when the container is not returned within arm's reach of the other person, a few words may be exchanged. 

Some people stretch the limits of a free coffee  and make a large iced coffee drink to go.  Getting this hot coffee to a temperature that will tolerate a 48 oz. plastic cup takes several wasted small cups and lots of ice machine mishaps.

Other people are stockpiling for the day.  it is so evident when one person comes in by herself and fixes several large cups with the exact combination of sugars and creams.  I saw an 85 year old woman come in.  She was all dressed up and she straddled her cane against her hip and the counter and she fixed herself four coffees, put them in a container and walked out with her cane in one hand and four coffees in a cardboard container in another.  I watched her walk down the street to her home.

I usually have a cup in the morning.  Then I swing around again in the afternoon and if I am passing by in the late evening, I grab two cups, one for the moment and one to be reheated in the morning.  And then the next day, I go back to my regular coffee consumption schedule and wait patiently for next year's great event.

Fair Warning

Coldfoot, Alaska

June 2007

Why would anyone live here.  I wasn't even comfortable being here.  What if we ran out of gas?  We would have been shit out of luck.

One-Eyed Monkey Bitch

 One-eyed Monkey Bitch
Ganges River
Varansia, India
July 2015

I ate breakfast every day with this ugly, one-eyed monkey bitch.  She sat on the other side of the cage and screeched at me.  Sometimes she would extend her hand and beg.  I would ignore her.  But I did have urges to touch her fingers and would have if I could have been assured that she wouldn't grab me back and put me some sort of deadly head lock.

Unresolved Issues

Unresolved Issues In My Life.

1- I am not a rock and roll star and probably never will be one. I have terrible voice, I can't remember words to songs and I have no sense of rhyme.
2- I always wanted to buy a pontoon boat because they are easy to drive and look like so much fun.  But the work to maintain a boat is now too much for me.
3- I bite my nails.  I have been a nail biter for 60 years so I don't think much is going to change.
4- I want to buy a small trailer and travel across country for long stretches at a time.  But my driving reversal skills are terrible and I don't think I will ever do this.
5- I never mastered a second language even though I studied French for five years and Latin for two years.
6- I am not reading as much as I used to do.  I need to get back in to reading novels on a regular basis.
7- I wanted to get 250,000 miles on my Honda but I only got 244,811.  Now I have a new Honda.  I drive 20,000 miles a year. It will take me 12 years to reach this goal and I don't think I have 12 years left.

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Searching for Hillary

Searching For Hillary
Democratic National Convention
The Last Night
Thursday, July 28, 2016
Philadelphia, PA


As the hour approached for Hillary to accept the nomination, I wanted to be there in the convention center to watch this historic moment.  There was only one problem with this thought:  I did not have ticket to get in to the arena.


I called my friend Jill.  She too is a big Hillary fan and her 13 year old daughter was advocating for Hillary so I decided that we should go out in search of Hillary on this big night.  I was sure we could get to the parking lot of the convention center and we would be with the crowd and in our own way be part of history.

So off we went with our rally signs and buttons and overwhelming enthusiasm.  I drive us there and exited from  I95South with the intent of just pulling in somewhere inconvenient in to the Well Fargo parking lot. Well, I was sadly mistaken with my illusion of reality.  We couldn't even get near the parking lot.  We were not even allowed near the surrounding area.  There was a mile wide blocked area.

With great disappointment, I then suggested we go to Cily Hall where all of the protesters had spent the week.  I thought they would give us some great entertainment.  I watched them earlier in the week. The Bernie People, the Black Lives Matter People, the Westboro Baptist Church members, the Anti- Hillary People, the Anti-abortionists, and the Anti-war people  have been out in full strength.  But they were nowhere to be found tonight.  They have all gone home.

Jill then suggested we go down to the Constitution Center.  She heard something may be going on there.  We hurry down there and found lots of people.  But the Center had been turned in to a Beer Garden and no one there had any interest in watching Hillary's speech.

It was now getting to be around 9PM and time was running out. We had to find somewhere to watch this moment.

"Come on, lets get some beer and go to my house, Jill suggested, "Ill call people to join us.

So we did.  We hurried home, settled ourselves and turned on the television. We watched it there and it was exciting.  I would have much preferred to be on the floor of the convention center.  I would have preferred to bat some of those big blue balloons.  I would have loved the opportunity to shake Hillary Clinton's hand.  But it didn't happen.  But the night was still fun.

10 Commandments Park

Montana

October 2016

I passed this park as I was driving and made a mental note to check it out at another time. I mentioned it to my friends I was visiting and they suggested I avoid this place unless I wanted to get an earful of their insufferable religious views.  I said I did want to hear from them.  I wanted to talk to someone who would spend all this money on these signs.  I wanted to know if they worked elsewhere?  Did they pay for this signs alone or did they take donations?  How many people visited this site in a year/  Did they have other activities for the general public?  Do they plan to expand? Is there any regard for other religions?

I was just filled with questions.  So off we went to conduct my interview.  I knocked on the door and no one was there.  So now, my questions remain unanswered.

The Sloth

The Sloth

Honduras

Spring 2011

I am on a tour bus in Honduras.  We are headed back to the hotel after a long day.  All of the sudden, the bus driver stops and puts the bus in reverse.  He stops and tell all of us to look out the left window.

"Do you see it?", he shouted.

We strain our necks and can't figure out what he wanted us to see.

"The sloth, see him just sitting there."

Then we do see him.  He is right in front of us but he is so still that we don't even notice him.  We watch him for a good fifteen minutes and there is absolutely no movement.  We tap on our windows.  We make lots of noise.  The 100 photos we took caused a flashing sensation which didn't phase him. After a few minutes, we calm down and just watch him. He doesn't move and his stillness begins to spook us. Finally, we surrender and leave, placing bets on how long we think he would stay in this position.

Turning 90

Turning 90

Thomas J. Kelly

b.September 4, 1926

d. July 18, 2017

Long Beach Island Celebration- October 2016

My grandmother died when she was 52.  My grandfather died when he was about 65.  Uncle Lawrence died at 32 years of age.  Uncle John died when he was 57.  My father was 76 when he died.  But Uncle Tom just keeps running.  We celebrated his 90th birthday with four generations in attendance.

Sahara Desert

 Sahara Desert

Morocco

July 8, 2008

I'm not sure anything needs to be said about this portrait of me.

Turkey Vultures

Turkey Vultures

Carpenter's Point, MD

They are ugly and I see them everyday. They eat every dead thing on the road.  I will pass a dead squirrel on my way to the store and by the time I return a few hours later, there is no semblance of it anywhere to be found.  As I sit out in my backyard, I see them flying and hovering over a certain area and I try to resist the thought that they may have their eyes on me.  Sometimes I purposely stand up just to create a presence.  Other times, I let out a little sigh of relief when they swore down on something and it isn't me.