I met with my daughter and son in law earlier this week. They suggested brunch at a place on south Lyndale Avenue called French Meadow. The food was lovely, many things I'd never had before, and with a pleasant day it was nice to eat and talk at sidewalk tables. OK, the talking got interrupted occasionally by ambulances going by, plus an occasional large truck, but we managed. Brunch and the company combined to make the first present.
It was an exchange, as I'm doing X-mas (and birthdays, Mother's Day, etc. etc.) early/late this year with a single present: wind chimes for people who live up here with a place to hang them, my project which kept me very busy the month before we headed north. It will do the same in the fall, presuming the dremel has been repaired so I can drill more glass pieces. Only then I'll have to figure out how to mail them. They don't fit boxes properly, so theirs when wrapped had a rather odd look to it. In fact, even after scotch taping its deformed box together, it still needed the wrapping paper to hold it together. (I made sure to buy packing tape for future presents. What I'll do this winter for mailing boxes to people we don't see here is anybody's guess.)
The first present for me was presented with the words, "This is your Mother's Day present..." Oh cool, I wasn't expecting one of those, and didn't mind it was over a month late because I was doing the same for somebody else, all in the interest of saving postage. "... from 2002." OK, interesting. "She went on to explain it was started back then and had taken her nearly 20 years to finish it. I pulled it out and found a picture frame holding a beautiful piece of rosemaling she had made. The center rectangle held flowers and various designs and colors filled the rest. All the colors are ones I really like, many matching my bedspread, and the workmanship is perfect. She explained that the glass in the frame was under the needlework as putting glass over it would squash the texture. It is absolutely beautiful.
She went on to comment that it isn't everyone who grows up with examples of it all over their houses. Wait, what? I never did any, nor bought any. Didn't even know the term. It's Norwegian, and that's not my heritage. It's from her paternal grandmother. Then I recalled Lylah's house, and things she kept in it. And of course the needlework she presented to me many years ago which now greets people who come through the front door. So that's it. I appreciate even more Steph learning how to do that, getting to do it so beautifully, and passing it along to me. Even if it took 20 years. Somehow that makes it more special.
But there was another present in the bag, a book. I'd glanced past the title as I was admiring the other present, but suddenly it came to me just what it really said and meant. The title is "We Never Knew Just What It Was." My brain kick-started with the matching melody. Of course! The Marvelous Toy! I suddenly had an earworm, the song running through my head over and over from all the repeat playing over the years of the record is was on.Ies, I said record. LP. Vinyl. Album. Of course: Chad Mitchell Trio!
Anybody young enough to not know who they were, go hit You Tube and listen. They were the best folk singers coming out of the 60s. Three voices melding perfectly, expressively, dramatically, humorously. To me they were even better than Peter Paul and Mary, though saying that in front of my husband is tantamount to heresy, as he has a special bond with his daughter over PP&M. Back in high school I collected their albums as they came out and budget permitted. I played them as much as possible, even went to a concert of theirs in St. Paul, despite passing on an opportunity around the same time to go see the Beatles, heresy to the girlfriend who'd asked me to go to their concert with her. I didn't want to return home deaf from hearing all the screaming of the fans instead of the music. True to my expectation, my girlfriend did just exactly that. She was hoarse too, being one of those screaming fans.
Those years were Vietnam war years, and much of the music is protest music, not just of wars but all the injustices of the world. In many ways I raised myself on their music, took my values from it, sang along with it (when the recordings were good enough I could tell what all the words were). I raised my kids with it. And here in my hands was a book that told the story of their careers, how they came together as a group and fell apart, how they lived after and finally came back together to sing again.
I admit I take most of that from the introduction to the book since I've only read three chapters so far. There is much else to do around here, people to see, weeds to pull or kill, more flowers to plant, laundry to haul up and down basement stairs. There's also a dog who has to be convinced that she needs to go outside. Yes, the grass is long and wet and cold on her belly, and the mosquitoes have hatched after all the rainy days, but really: She needs to go pee! Even if it means I have to put on my shoes and grab her leash and drag her. Even, especially, if anybody has lit off a firecracker within a mile in the last two hours! So what if we have a fenced back yard? She will just hold it.
But I did make one glorious discovery just as I was putting it back down after the first reading binge. I'd skipped past the first couple pages in my hurry to start reading the book, so I missed one page. It just happens to contain the signatures of all three of the Trio!
O.M.G!!! One of my best presents ever!
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