growing up

On being (a) Yo Yo Ma

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‘The Empty Nest has its Ups and Downs’

By now you probably know more facts about The Child than The Child feels comfortable about you knowing. But she’s off in Boston making a name for herself as a software engineer and therefore can’t roll her eyes heavenward in ‘My Mom is Oversharing Again’ dismay. At least not where I can see her.

So I’m going to riff a little about ‘parenting’. First, let me make my distaste for terms like ‘parenting’ clear. The use of nouns as verbs (‘crafting’, ‘birding’, even ‘blogging’) tends to make my own eyes roll heavenward. I mean, if I’m ‘parenting’, is The Child ‘kidding’?

But I must admit that I rather like my new not-yet-trendy term ‘Yo Yo Ma’, which I will explain shortly. But first, have you heard of Snowplow Parents?  Continue reading

The King and I

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‘Getting my Blue Suede Shoes(On)’

Last week the one and only Elvis Aaron Presley, bless his heart (and swiveling hips) would have celebrated his 80th birthday. (Big pause to take that in).

Now you Young People out there may need a bit of Elvis Ed (which you can find right here). But before you Wikipedia yourselves senseless, let me just say that, in his day, Elvis could have out teened-frenzied that Bieber Boy with one pouty lip tied behind his back (now there’s an image). And here’s an image of each; you be the judge. But do notice how Elvis didn’t need to resort to tattoos to look, um, hot. And he never posed in his (or Calvin’s) underwear. Not that I know of, anyway.

So. This story happened Continue reading

The Year of the Snake

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Year of the Snake

 

Or, How The Child almost did not come to exist.

First, let me just say that, yes, I know that 2015 isn’t really the Year of the Snake. It’s the Year of the Sheep. Which doesn’t sound nearly as sassy. As a matter of fact, Chinese families everywhere have been working the calendar so that their babies’ births do not fall during the Year of the Sheep. (If you care, you can read why here, especially if you think I might be making this up.)

Well, anyway. It’s the 7th of January, and I know I really should have written this post last Wednesday, but it was New Year’s Eve and I was afraid everyone (but me and the Dude) would be out celebrating, so I posted that piece about ‘When Harry Met Sally’ instead. So sue me.

But back to me and snakes. Continue reading

Larry and the Nose Holes

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‘A college boy learns his lesson’

I must have 8-year-olds on the brain. Last week, I wrote about how The Child learned about the Birds and the Bees. Now I’m going to tell you about the time my Favorite Sister went to college — when she was only in Third Grade.

See, I love my brothers. All three of them. But, as the Oldest of the Henry Clan, and the Only Girl for ages and ages, I really wanted a little sister. And, when I finally got one — when I was nine, for heavens’ sakes — I wanted her around me pretty much all the time. I even had my parents put her crib in my room. (Which I imagine didn’t take too much arm-twisting. Before that, the crib was in their room.) Anyway, here she is, in all her infant glory:

Clinging to my prize, flanked by two out of three eventual bros

Clinging to my prize, flanked by two out of three eventual brothers

We’ll jump ahead for the purposes of this story. To when I left home to go to college. University of Missouri, that was. So I could go to Journalism School and become Brenda Starr. If you (undoubtedly) have no idea who that was, click here to find out. But first, Continue reading

The Incest Mug

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‘Aha! So that explains it’

‘Incest’, eh? You might be thinking that’s a frisky topic for Lutheranliar. But I figure now is a perfect time to get this story out of my system, since almost everybody’s away from their computers doing their Christmas shopping. And all the other people not away from their computers are probably doing their Christmas shopping too.

So, hah. I’m thinking the chances of ruining my social standing and/or becoming shunned by polite society are fairly slim since nobody’s going to read it anyway. So, here’s the story.  Continue reading

Turkey Shoot

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‘At least it’s not Christmas’

Tuesday Night: Sipping a very large Manhattan to reward myself for having made the piecrust (yes, I make my own), I’m tipsily (If that’s not a real word, then it should be) writing my post while waiting for the Big Beef to do its braising thing. (More on Big Beef later.)

Today (if it is in fact Wednesday when you’re reading this) is Thanksgiving Eve. Before I get started raving about Thanksgiving, just take a look at two of the things I like best about this particular holiday:

Fingers crossed this year’s pies are as good as last year’s: Left, apple. On the right, cranberry-apple.

Anyway, I know I promised not to rant. Nor shall I. But allow me to expound instead on the virtues of Thanksgiving. It’s not that I don’t like Christmas. But let’s compare the two festive occasions, shall we? Then, you decide.

Why, in my humble opinion, Thanksgiving beats the tinsel out of Christmas: Continue reading

Kissing Daddy Good-Night

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‘Korea. Worlds away from Kirkland, Illinois’

I don’t actually remember any of this, of course. But I grew up hearing about ‘when Daddy was in Korea and we lived at Gramma’s house’.

See, my Dad was a Second Lieutenant in the Air Force. I’m going to check with Mom, but I’m pretty sure he went to college via the ROTC. For you Whippersnappers, that’s the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Which means, essentially, that you trade getting some $$ to go to school for serving your country when you get out. Of school, I mean. Here Dad is at his graduation. Everyone in this picture, except me, is a Proud Parent. (Though I did eventually become one, as you know all too well.)

My Dad at his U of I graduation. He is holding me instead of his diploma.

My Dad at his U of I graduation. He is holding me instead of his diploma.

So, I had hardly even met my Dad when off he goes. To Korea. He was originally supposed to go to the Philippines with Mom, and me too. (We both got malaria shots in preparation for this; supposedly, one shot makes you impervious to malaria for a lifetime. I’m not eager to test this theory.)

But it turned out that some important papers Continue reading

All Saints’ (Birth)Day

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‘And the years just keep on coming’

I simply must stop wearing The Child’s discarded Stuyvesant High School tee shirt. It says ‘Seniors’ on the front, and the other day a friend thought I was declaring my membership in an Age Group.

While I’m not at an age where I’d like to blurt out a number (I think you have to be either really young — “I’m 3! Going on 4!” — or really old — “I’m 97! If I make it to June!” — to want to blurt), I do feel okay telling you Continue reading

Happy Ho-Made Halloween

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‘A Simple Costume can do the trick. And get the treat.’

I blame it on The Headless Horseman. This was a Halloween costume I thought up, oh, when I was nearing the end of my trick-or-treating career. Like, when I was about 11. Appearing ‘headless’ involved poking the ends of my Mom’s yardstick through the sleeves of her ‘borrowed’ raincoat and balancing said yardstick on top of my covered-with-a-scarf head. The dangling ends of the sleeves were safety-pinned to a pair of Dad’s utility gloves, one of which was attached (somehow, the details are a bit fuzzy now) to a carved Jack-o-Lantern, so it looked like the Headless Horseman was carrying his head. I mean, if you were very young and impressionable or old and almost blind it looked like the Headless Horseman was carrying his head. But that was good enough for me.

You see, we Henrys were a family of Costume Makers. As opposed to Costume Buyers. I don’t think my parents were the type to buy, much less encase me, in a teensy infant Devil Onesie. But maybe they did, and I was just too little to know about it. If they did, Continue reading

Dad Eggs and Ham

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‘Sunday-Night Supper at the Henry House’

As some of you may know from my ubiquitous FaceBook presence, I recently spent a most glorious Family Fall Weekend with my brother Roger and his lovely wife Nobody-Doesn’t-Like-Jenn. It was my favorite kind of weekend because, basically, we really didn’t do much. Looked at slides of my nephew’s wedding. Hung out on the Porch of Ill Repute with glasses of wine. Played with the across-the-street neighbor’s baby. (Hi, Olivia! Hi, Olivia’s Mom Amanda!)

Oh, and being Henrys, we also ate a lot of food. Like Roger’s chili, which he makes in large vats then freezes into chili-sicles for emergency guests-are-here use. (He also bestows these as gifts to neighbors. Move near him, if you can.)  Roger also continues to make the Peterson Christmas-Eve Oyster Stew, but I’ll have to wait to eat it. And you’ll have to wait to hear about it.

You do get to hear about Dad Eggs, though. Dad Eggs is a dish my Dad (in photo above) concocted to Give Mom a Break on Sunday Nights. See, Sundays were the days we went to (Lutheran) Church, then stuck around after the service to eat pastries and watch Pastor Kahre smoke, then went home to the main meal of the day, usually a large roast of some kind. (Remind me to tell you about ‘heart meat’; trust me, it’s in no way similar to ‘eye of round’).

So, since Mom had gone to a lot of trouble (gravy! remember gravy?), and we were all still kind of full when suppertime rolled around, Dad would go into his act. Continue reading