Glory Days

Glory Days

Around the middle of March, 2011, a group of four people sat down and formalized their intentions to vacation together in April of 2012. The four people were myself, my wife Judy and our friends Dan and Alice. This fearsome foursome placed a down payment on an “Exotic Caribbean Cruise”, toasted the momentous occasion with a fine bottle of wine and then settled down to wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And sometime early-on in that stretch of time they realized that it would be over 400 days until they sailed.

F-o-u-r h-u-n-d-r-e-d d-a-y-s!

And after that excruciatingly long period of time had finally passed, the often-thought about and long-hoped for day had, at last, finally come around.

It was time to pack the bags, kiss the dog, put the kid in the kennel, scurry on down to the airport and head for Miami.

The following pages chronicle the adventures and the fun times of that trip. Come along if you care to.

***

On Saturday, April 21 our long-awaited vacation had arrived. My wife Judy and I had a hard time sleeping the previous night. That was our normal modus operandi for the day before a vacation. The big difference in this one as compared to most of the others was the fact that we did NOT have to get up at the crack of dawn (or before) to head on out. We weren't planning on leaving the house until 10 am. So after a semi-restful night and a leisurely breakfast, we bade a fond farewell to the dog and son who were remaining behind and drove to Columbus. We arrived around noon in a cold drizzle. Ohio was letting us know that it was still EARLY spring in these climes and it made us eager for the more comfortable temperatures that were sure to await us in Florida. Our flight left around 3:30 that afternoon and, after an uneventful flight, we arrived at Fort Lauderdale around 6. The transportation company I'd contracted with to drive us to Miami was right up to speed and picked us up virtually when we walked out of the terminal with our luggage. After our driver Miguel dropped us off at the Intercontinental Hotel in downtown Miami, we checked in and checked out our new digs. Our rooms were extremely nice and gave us great views of the area. We were hungry by that time so we grabbed a taxi to the Bayside Market a few blocks from the hotel. Bubba Gump's Shrimp Company Restaurant was located there and that's were we had supper. The food was good and the waitress was a good one. She quizzed us on the Forest Gump movie after we'd eaten. It was all in fun.

After supper we wandered into the nearby Bayside Market. This is an open-air mall right alongside the bay in downtown Miami. The air was balmy and it was a perfect night to look into the shops and kiosks selling their wares. I heard some music with a definite Latin beat and looked around until I found the source. They had a small stage set up next to the water and several rows of seats in front of it. On the stage was a group performing. Three or four men playing instruments and a lady singer. There was a substantial crowd gathered around, a few dozen dancing and the rest swaying and grooving to the music. I looked up the name of the group after I got home and found out it was called “Maria con Azucar”. That's Spanish for Maria with Sugar. Excellent salsa music. I think it was Salsa. Very Latin, mostly sung in Spanish and with a wonderful beat. We stayed there and grooved to the rhythm for quite a while.

While enjoying the music I looked around a bit. Most of the folks around us were definitely Hispanic, probably Cuban, as Miami has a vast Cuban population. They seemed a friendly folk on the most part, and I felt comfortable there. Maybe I was naïve, but I really dug the Cuban ambiance.

After a great strawberry daiquiri we adjourned back to the hotel. As a Miami Heat game was letting out right next door, taking a taxi back to the hotel was virtually impossible, so we walked. It was only a couple blocks and, at least for me, the tropical night was velvet on my skin and quite invigorating. We were back to the hotel by 11 and soon slumbering in our fancy hotel rooms.

***

Sunday morning dawned bright and warm in Miami and we were up around 8. Breakfast for Judy and I was a coffee and pastry at the Starbucks in the lobby of the hotel. The in-house restaurant was very fancy with commensurate prices, so the choice of Starbucks was easy for us. Around 10:30 we gathered our luggage and grabbed a cab to the pier. The boarding went quite smoothly and we were on board the Glory easily by noon. We lunched at the Red Sail Buffet and did a little ship exploring until our staterooms were ready at 1:30.

We went for the mandatory lifeboat drill a bit later on deck four. We found out later that the U.S. Coast Guard was performing some sort of inspection that day, so our drill was VERY intensive. All the passengers were required to line up at their muster stations on the outside boat deck to listen to the instructions. When we were all there, which took a while, we were standing in a five-deep line the whole length of the ship, both sides. Normally the instructions are given in English, but since this was a SPECIAL one, they repeated ALL the instructions in Spanish and German. Holy moly! It was excruciatingly long! But I didn't really begrudge the time due to the recent capsizing of the Costa Concordia in Italy. I wanted to know what to do in an emergency!

Sail away was at 4 o'clock and we watched the million-dollar yachts and multi-million-dollar homes and condos slip by as we headed out into the Atlantic.

We found our dining room at 6 o'clock for our first dinner aboard. We were in the Golden Dining Room (the other one was the Platinum Dining Room). We had three dining room stewards, Fritz who was, perhaps, Indonesian; Monica who was Slovakian and Karieda who was Phillipino. Our drink steward was Johnny. As this day was our traveling companion Dan's birthday, we surprised him with a chocolate cake after dinner. The stewards put a candle in it and had Dan blow it out. Then they all sang happy birthday. It was nice! Dan was surprised and happy – chocolate is his fave!

After supper we wandered into the casino and played the slots for a little while. After that we attended the “Welcome Aboard” show in the Amber Palace Showroom. We saw the Cruise Director Trevor and his ACD John. We also met the first two comedians that would perform on board this week. We'd get two new ones in San Juan. It was a nice intro to the ship and what to expect for the week.

Back to the cabin by 11:30 and off to dreamland with the bed gently rocking on the waves.

***

On Monday we were up around 7:30 and breakfasted with Alice and Dan in the Red Sail Buffet. We sat at a window seat and gazed out at Nassau, Bahamas. We returned to our cabins, applied sunscreen and then left the boat for a day's exploring. The sea water around here is a remarkably clear turquoise color, a striking shade of blue that almost looks artificial.

Getting from the ship into Nassau itself entailed a bit of a walk on the pier – we were docked at the furthest berth as two Disney ships, the Magic and the Dream were closer in. Then you entered a long building and had to walk the entire length of it before getting to an exit to the town. And, of course, the building was full of places to spend your money! We discovered that all the ports would be set up similarly.

After running this gauntlet, the women split off to do some shopping and Dan and I took a hike up a hill toward a water tower. I wanted to get a geocache near there. After a strenuous walk uphill we arrived at a man-made cut in the rocky hillside with a long stone staircase at the end of it. This was the famous Queen's Staircase. While searching for the geocache in the cut we were approached by a Bahamian gentleman who assisted us in finding the hidden caches and regaled us with the story of the area. It was fascinating and we totally enjoyed his company and humor. He was, of course, one of the guides of the area and we tipped him generously for his efforts. We also greatly enjoyed his Bahamian accent. A lot of the people of the Caribbean speak quite similiarly as we were to find during our trip, especially in St. Thomas and Grand Turk. We then climbed the staircase – 64 steps – one step for each year of Queen Victoria's reign.

On top of the staircase was Ft. Fincastle, one of the apparently inexhaustible supply of forts in the Caribbean. There was obviously LOTS of fighting going on in these parts in the old days. This particular fort was built in the shape of a paddle wheel steamship, for what reason I never did find out. We took many pictures from the top of this fort as the view was spectacular from there with the ships at dock below us and the fabulous Atlantis Resort just across the bay on Paradise Island.

After getting our fill of the view we headed downhill (hurrah!) toward Bay Street, the main street of Nassau where all the shops were. We ambled through a few on our way back to the ship. We couldn't stay too long as we were due to leave at 2 in the afternoon. We got back on board the ship around noon and the women arrived at 1.

We lunched again at the buffet (we did that a lot that week). Judy and I ate at the fish 'n chips place on the 2^nd level of the Red Sail. It was nice – real similar to perhaps Long John Silver's fish except you could also get some cold dishes too, like ceviche.

Sail away from Nassau was soon after that and we took some more pictures. We didn't get off exactly on time as we had some runners to wait a bit for. Watching the runners, people who almost miss the boat and have to run for it, seems to be almost a sport amongst some cruisers. One lady was ambling back to the boat until she saw some crew members yelling at her and motioning her to hurry. She started jogging then! It was funny. In a conversation with a crew member later that evening they said that the ships quite frequently left passengers on Nassau. They'd get drunk and just forget they needed to get back on board!

That'd be awful!

The wind had freshened during our stay in port, so the rest of the day was a bit bouncy. I'd been concerned about whether I might end up seasick sometime, but was just fine.

I then attended a seminar in the spa on how to eliminate back pain. It was (are you waiting for it) a sales pitch for shoe inserts! For a measly $189! What a steal! I was sooooooo surprised! Not.

I then luxuriated in a soon-to-be-repeated indulgence for the week. I took a lil' nap!

That evening we had reservations at the Steakhouse Restaurant on board. This is the “for extra fee” place that I'd read such glowing reviews on. We all put our fancy duds on and headed up there. Unfortunately our group had to give the Steakhouse a thumbs-down. At best the food was so-so. I had escargot for the appetizer, surf 'n turf for the entree and a baked apple pastry for dessert. The fillet mignon was NOT tender and the service was quite slow and spotty. They even delivered the wrong dishes to us – Alice got my steak and I got hers. For supposedly being the PREMIER dining spot on the ship we were disappointed. The manager offered us a bottle of wine for our troubles but we declined. We just wanted out of there.

We then changed into more comfortable clothes and went to the Punchliner Comedy club where we watched a Cuban comedian, Al Romero. He was fairly funny. We believed the other comedian would be funnier and later found out he was. My lower back was really hurting about this time, probably from all the walking, step-climbing, etc. I'd done, so we headed back to the cabin. The ship was still moving fairly noticeably, but sleeping with the motion was like being rocked in the cradle.

It was a nice day for our introduction to the Caribbean, a nice Nassau day.

***

Tuesday was an “at sea” day as our ship had to make the long trek south-by-southeast from Nassau to St. Thomas. Judy and I arose around 9 am to a day with low clouds and threatening rain. Breakfast was again at the Red Sail on the Lido deck. After that we wandered on down to the Amber Palace to watch the “Fun Ashore and Fun Aboard” show with Trevor Block, our Cruise Director. He talked a bunch about what was coming up on the islands ahead of us and what else we could do on the ship. He was funny and quite informative. Then it was time for the “Fun Finds Shopping Show” with Diamond Dominique. It consisted of LOTS of sales pitching for the upcoming stops, especially St. Thomas and San Juan. She particularly pitched some specific jewelry stores in the upcoming stops. She ain't called “Diamond” Dominique for nuttin'! We hoped for some prizes she was awarding, but didn't get lucky.

Had jerk chicken for lunch (I loved it, Judy didn't) and watched the parade of cruisers walking by in the passageway. I was amazed by the diversity of the people. It's really a cosmopolitan crowd. You're just as likely to hear French or German or Spanish as English. Or, then again, one of the hundreds of other languages common on cruise ships. You sort of expect that from the crew who are almost totally non-English as their primary language, but there were LOTS of foreign language passengers aboard also. Spanish might have been the predominant one actually.

By the way, the chocolate frozen yogurt was wonderful!

We then strolled to the open Lido deck by the pool and jumbo screen and watched the end of the hairy chest contest which is a staple on most cruises. It soon started raining, so we ducked under cover. It had been threatening to rain most of the day. Just glad it wasn't a port day.

We adjourned to the cabin and soon my bride was snoozing. For some reason I wasn't too sleepy at the moment, so I went to my “special” deck. I'd read about a “secret” door that led to a deck on the ship that most folks didn't know about. I found the door at the bow end of deck 7 and it opened to a deck directly under the bridge. Totally empty. I stood there a while watching flying fish and hoping for a dolphin when a lady approached smoking a cigarette. We chatted a bit – she was originally from Columbus, Ohio – and she told me that a whale had been spotted on the port side of the ship earlier that day. Kinda wished I'd had seen that. Oh well...

When I got back to our cabin I found a stuffed squirrel plush toy in our mailbox! Alice, of course. She wanted to give me a “thank you” gift for all the planning I'd done for the trip. I thought it was fun and thanked her for her thoughtfulness.

Went to our first “elegant” night supper at 6 pm. It was a nice dinner. I had stuffed mushrooms and strawberry soup for appetizers, lobster tail and shrimp for my entree. Judy had a fine-looking prime rib for her entree. Of course it was warm chocolate melting cake for all of us for dessert. We chatted with our steward Karieda for a bit. He's married to one of the other stewards, a pretty lady, and they have one more month to serve before leaving the ship for a 2-month leave at home. After that they planned to take another contract on another Carnival ship in the Mediterranean. Sounded nice! We had some formal photos taken after supper and then headed back to the cabin to change clothes and head to the comedy club again. We watched Mark Simmons this time and he was REALY funny. After that we hit the casino. I had a $5 matching credit from some drinks we'd bought, so I matched it with another $5 on the roulette table and won – then lost the next 3 rolls. I pulled out a $20 and bought some more chips. Played about an hour and cashed out $53. I was up and felt pretty good. I'm definitely NOT a high-roller, but up is up and that's good enough.

***

On Wednesday the ship docked in St. Thomas, United States Virgin Islands, while we were eating breakfast in the Platinum Dining Room. We wanted to get in at least one breakfast that wasn't in the buffet. Had Eggs Benedict. I seem to remember it being better the last time I'd eaten it, but my taste buds have been “off” for a while so it just could have been me.

We left the boat at 10:15. We had reservations with a tour guide named Sunny Liston and found his jitney bus quickly. He was waiting for his other customers and would not leave until 11. Dan and I walked over to the cache I wanted to get on St. Thomas while we waited. It was about 600 feet from the jitney. We returned and Sunny started his tour at 11.

Sunny is QUITE the fascinating island character. He started his banter as the jitney pulled out of the parking lot near the docks, explaining this and that as he headed out. Since they were having carnival on St. Thomas that week and the Charlotte Amalie (the main town of the island) shopping area would be a traffic nightmare, he skipped the short shopping part of the tour altogether and started up the mountain. St. Thomas traffic drives on the left, similar to Nassau which we'd seen two days ago. The roads are narrow and twisty. Sunny drove to a parking area about half-way up the mountain and stopped. He got out, stood on a rock and commenced to describe the view from that vantage point. It looked out over the Caribbean side of the island with the cruise ships in the background. He talked about the island, the other islands in view, some of the history of the area and peppered his talk with jokes and island humor. We all really enjoyed it. Then it was back on the bus and hang on as he drove up the switchbacks to Mountaintop. When we reached this area, he parked and led us to an area where we could see the northern part of the island, the Atlantic side. There were more islands in the distance which he talked about and a beautiful bay and beach spread out at our feet. It's called Magen's Bay. National Geographic and Conde Nast Traveler have rated it as one of the best 10 beaches in the world. It was very pretty.

We were then allowed 20 minutes to wander through the gift shop located there and to try, if we wanted, one of the “World Famous Banana Daiquiris” that they mixed up there. As a side note, they were VERY good!

We then climbed back aboard the jitney for the hair-raising trip down the mountain. As he careened along the narrow streets he played his CD of Soca music (Soul Calypso) at a mighty volume, sang along and encouraged us passengers to join in at appropriate points. With banana daiquiris flowing through our systems and the great music playing we hollered along when we were supposed to and totally dug the fun ride. Soon he arrived at Magen's Bay Beach where he dropped off about half the busload of people with a promise to pick them up in two and a half hours. He then zoomed over to the eastern part of the island to Coki Point Beach where the rest of us alighted for our apportioned two and a half hours of beach time.

Coki Point Beach is another beauty spot of St. Thomas with sparkling clear blue water and soft white sand. We rented some chairs and an umbrella and set up on the beach. I'd also got a mask and snorkel to see the read-about fish swimming near there. As promised, about a hundreds yards south, near some rocks in the water swam a multitude of brightly-colored tropical fish. The little store that rented the mask also provided a Milk Bone dog biscuit to use as fish food to attract the fish, which it did. Alice and I puttered around quite a while in the water while Dan and Judy stayed under cover. They have problems with too much sun and were being careful. As it turned out, I should have followed their example as I contracted a dandy sunburn for the day. I'd dosed with sunscreen earlier but it must have washed off in the salt water. A lady walked by our chairs with menus from her beach eatery and we ordered some drinks and french fries. When she returned with the order she also had a free shot of the local rum for anyone interested. I volunteered and it was good!

We left the beach and tried to get some of the sand off of us, but it was pretty hopeless. Sunny returned as promised and drove us back to the ship docks. We noticed on this drive that gas was around $4.99 on the island. After returning to the docks I slipped into a nearby grocery for some black rum that I'd promised some people back home. Hopefully it would make it back in our suitcases without being broken in transit.

We were back on the ship at 4:15 and the ship slipped its moorings and returned to sea at 6.

Supper was in the Main Dining Room. I had a nice mixed seafood dish and Judy had beef strogonoff. Alice and Dan entered the dining room from the rear entrance and were thrown off by it as the room looked identical from either end. They tried to sit down at another table and were gently escorted by some stewards to the correct one where Judy and I were waiting and grinning at their mix-up!

I had noticed a stinging in my lower left leg since leaving our beach and it was smarting a bit right then. I think something in the water had stung me, perhaps a small jelly fish??? It smarted for about 12 hours before subsiding.

The performance in the Amber Palace that night was a magic and dance routine. The magician was VERY good, the illusions were super and the dance was very energetic and kind of dark with booming moody music casting a suspenseful aura to all that went on. Totally enjoyable.

We were bushed so we went directly to the cabin and bed after the performance. What old party poopers we were!

***

Up on Thursday at 7:15, showered/shaved and breakfasted in the Red Sail again. Sat by a window and looked at San Juan, Puerto Rico, which had “magically” appeared earlier that morning. Another beautiful, sunny Caribbean day! We are soooooo lucky! It's becoming a daily miracle to wake up and see another country just outside the window.

Dan and Alice ate at the Platinum Restaurant again for their breakfast. They'd been staying up late and had a harder time arising in the a.m.

As I had an hour or so to kill before Alice and Dan would be ready to leave to tour the island, I ducked out by myself early and grabbed a geocache which was located about a quarter-mile east of where the ship was docked. The cache site was a pretty little harbor-side park with a hundred pigeons around to keep the park visitors company. I found the cache quickly and returned to the ship. The four of us finally got off together around 10. We walked across the street and caught one of the free trolleys for our explorations. Judy and Alice got on the one that was supposed to go to the shopping areas in Old San Juan first. We waved them goodbye and wished them well. Dan and I hopped on the next one that was to go to the nearby forts. We rode it through really heavy traffic out to El Morro, the fort located on the east side of the peninsula. It's a massive stone fortress that looks out over the blue water. We wandered over this National Park site and took lots of pictures. Even saw a “friendly” iguana on one of the massive stone walls. After pretending we were firing off cannons at attacking pirates, we wandered down the loooooong hillside to look for a cache that was “supposed” to be there. After fruitlessly searching for some time we wearily climbed the hill to the fort again and caught the next trolley back toward Old San Juan.

We jumped off the trolley near some restaurants and shopping areas and wandered around for a while. We bought some souvenirs, stopped for a free rum drink at Don Q's and another drink at Senor Frogs before returning to the ship around 2. Judy and Alice were already back on board. They'd had problems with their trolley. It had been unable to make it's circle through Old San Juan as, according to some policia who informed their driver, the Governor was in town and the trolley was not allowed on those streets at that time. I have NO idea what that meant, but Judy and Alice had to return to the original trolley stop and grab a fort trolley to at least get an overview of the area. They ended up shopping a bit near the ship. A disappointing day for them, unfortunately.

Back on board Judy and I found an invitation waiting in our cabin to attend the “past guest” party as we'd cruised with Carnival in the past. We attended and had a few freebie drinks, some hors d'orvres and listened to our Cruise Director Trevor thank all of us for choosing Carnival. We then watched a short film on the history of the company that was interesting. I was surprised that there was only a couple hundred attendees. I thought there would be lots more.

At dinner that evening we were visited by our maitre d', 007. Double-O Seven was the name he went by. He was wearing a Rastafarian-style multi-colored knit hat with black dreadlocks cascading over his neck. It was funny as hell as he was a very distinguished-looking Italian gentleman!

I was starting to get a bit jaded from all the rich, fancy food about then. Getting hungry for Mickey D's or our favorite girl Wendy! Aren't we such plebes!

Went to the “Love and Marriage” show that evening. The Assistant Cruise Director John selected 3 couples from the audience to participate. First was an old married couple – 60 years. Next was a couple married around 32 years. The last was a couple married the previous day. The newlyweds were VERY large African-Americans, the male of which was named Spoony Love! Heaven knows if it was a real name, but... maybe? The show was based on the old TV show “The Newlywed Game”. They asked 10 questions to the couples and they compared answers from husband and wife to see how close they were. The old married couple won. The newlyweds looked as if they wouldn't see their 2^nd week anniversary! It was hilarious in a cruel sort of way!

Looking forward to our last port, Grand Turk, tomorrow.

***

Up around 8 on Friday. Went to a high deck after breakfast and watched the ship approach the dock at Grand Turk Island. There was a Holland America Line ship already docked – the Noordam. We left the ship at 11-ish and picked up our pre-rented golf cart to explore the island. We drove around a bit, on the left side, of course, and gradually found our way out to the lighthouse on the northern tip of Grand Turk. Hardly any of the roads are marked, so you're navigating mostly by dead reckoning. Luckily I had a geocache loaded into my GPSr which was close to the lighthouse, so I used it to find my way. I located the cache easily when we arrived and we checked out the beautiful scenery around the lighthouse. Apparently it's a marvelous spot for whale watching during certain months of the year. Their migration route is just offshore.

We then puttered back toward the only town of significance on the 2 mile by 5 mile island, Cockburn Town. We enjoyed seeing the multitudes of donkeys, cattle, dogs and horses that roam freely across the island. In some places you have to drive around them as they stand in the road. We visited the Turks National Museum and learned about a shipwreck found close to the island which they originally thought might be the Pinta, one of Columbus' ships. It turned out not to be but was of the same era.

We lunched near the museum at a tiny eating place, actually just 3 picnic tables under a roof. Had conch fritters, french fries and conch chowder. The fritters were yummy, similar to hush puppies with chunks of conch. The chowder was OK, but had too many carrots in it for my taste. I put on some screamingly potent hot sauce which was available on the picnic table onto my fritters. Soon had sweat streaming from the heat.

We returned the golf cart to the pickup point near the cruise center after putting $20 of gas in it. Gas on this island, if you're curious, was going for $5.98 a gallon. Be thankful for our local prices, folks. We poked around the shops in the cruise center for a short, while then returned to the ship by 4.

Judy and I decided to play hookey at our 2^nd formal night on the ship. Just didn't want to dress up and each rich food again. So she and I ate lightly at the buffet in our shorts and tee-shirts. After a leisurely supper we visited the deck where all the photos taken by the Carnival staff were located and bought a few of us. Afterward we went back to the Amber Palace Showroom to watch the “Living in America” show. Lots of high-energy singing and dancing. Quite good, actually. Hit the casino afterward. Played roulette a bit and made $20 last quite a while. Saw a guy hit a number right next to me. He'd bet $20 on the single number and hit for over $600. Wow! Went to the late comedy show at 11:45 that night and the comedian was quite good.

Tomorrow is our last sea day. We're heading home.

***

Woke up later than usual on Saturday, around 9. Ate a bit lighter at the Red Sail as I seem to have developed a nasty head cold. Can't really taste anything. Quite an affliction on a cruise with their myriad of things to eat. Dammit.

Shopped at the ship's store as the last day of the cruise is always a sale day – two tee-shirts and a Glory magnet. Slipped back to the cabin after that to go over our receipts and fill out the customs declaration and bag tags for tomorrow's debarkation. Judy and I are going to the wristwatch raffle and sale at noon. This is, I guess, a tradition on Carnival ships. They get a lot of wristwatch sets, men's and women's, and raffle off some and put the rest on sale.

Upon our arrival at the store at noon we saw a couple hundred folks milling about and hovering over two long cloth-covered tables. Apparently that was where the soon-to-be-on-sale watches were hiding. We listened to the drawing for the freebie (we did not win – surprise) and then the sale was commenced. The coverings were withdrawn from the tables and the horde descended! The gift sets were sold all week for $39.99. Today they were going for $19.99 and were SUPPOSED to retail for $50 to $100. People were grabbing them up by the 3's and 4's. I couldn't even get close enough to the tables to look at them. We waited for about 10-15 minutes until we could examine some of the ones left. When I looked at them I was not surprised to see some decidedly cheap-looking watches. I'd guess they would wholesale for $9 to $15. Nothing even remotely attractive to my eyes.

Went back to the fish 'n chips area for lunch. They also had running concurrently their chocolate buffet. Mmmm... Looked marvelous! I partook, but had to ask Judy if any of it was good. Drat this stuffed up nose!

Went back to the cabin then to put on long pants and try to warm up a bit. It's a little cool on the open decks and the air conditioner seems to be working overtime. I considered it might be my cold making me chilled, but Judy was chilly also.

I discovered at lunch today that my camera which I had kept strapped onto my belt all week was gone. Uh-oh! It was odd as I had to take my belt off to remove the camera case. We looked ALL over the cabin and had no luck until Judy at last found it. It was sitting next to the... er... toilet. Apparently it had fallen off my belt during one of my... interludes there? Thank goodness. Losing the camera would NOT have been a good thing.

Supper back in the MDR. Last night supper on cruises is always a sad time. The dining room crew always sings the “Leaving on a Fun Ship” song (to the tune “Leaving on a Jet Plane”) and everyone realizes that the cruise is over. We gave hearty handshakes to the male stewards and hugs to our Monica. I was so choked up I could hardly speak. I found out later that Judy was affected the same way. What sentimental fools we are!

Back in the cabin we found that the nightly bed turn-down had been completed and our rum from St. Thomas had been delivered. We finished packing the big suitcases that we would put out in the hallway that night and inserted the rum bottles tightly wrapped with dirty clothes for padding into the center of one. We then crossed our fingers!

Went to the last big show at the Amber Palace. It was the “American Legends” show and starred... us! They had auditioned cruisers all week, hunting for people who wanted to portray famous singers. Tonight they were all costumed up and came out one by one to sing. Some of the people portrayed were: Elvis, Sonny and Cher, Frank Sinatra, Elton John, Brittney Spears, Aretha Franklin and a few others. And they were GOOD! One portrayal was done by the Assistant Cruise Director John and it was SO funny. He was dressed as a woman and... the song and skit was hilarious. This was a fine and fitting finish to the cruise!

Back to the room then to put the big suitcases out and to scour the room for anything we might have missed. Then off to dreamland for our last night in our snug little cabin on the seas.

***

So today is the day we say goodbye to our beautiful ship Glory and all her crew. Always a sad day. But the pull of home was strong so we went forward with half a smile. Up at 6:45, cleaned up and off to the Red Sail for breakfast. For the last time. Ate lightly and noticed out the window that it was raining heavily in Miami. We vacated our room at 8:30 to give our steward time to freshen the room for the next cruiser later that day and went to the Amber Palace to wait for our group number to be called for debark. We were called around 11 and we exited the ship on the same gangway we'd entered a week ago. (Has it been THAT long ago?) Customs was surprisingly swift – barely a glance at our passports and customs declarations – and we were soon grabbing our bags and slipping out the terminal's front door and getting picked up by our service to take us to Ft. Lauderdale airport. After a quick drive in the rain we arrived at the airport, checked in and received our boarding passes. Again we passed through the miserable TSA security process and sat down at a Chili's II for lunch. Then we waited for our 3:15 flight to Atlanta. We left the rain somewhere between Ft. Lauderdale and Atlanta – it was sunny and warm there. Another long wait until our 9:30 flight to Columbus. After landing there and getting our baggage (it all made the flights with us) we were in the car and heading home by 11:30 – a long travel day for us tired sailors. A smooth drive home in the moonlight and soon we were snuggled in our own familiar bed. The cruise was over.

***

Before closing this recounting of the trip I thought some post-cruise thoughts might be of interest.

It's amazing how parochial I've become, how accustomed I've become to the little world I inhabit. Being on the ship with a large group of people from vastly different backgrounds can make you understand how wide the world actually is and how differently other people see things. English was not the majority language on board That would probably be Spanish, but there were lots of other ones that were quite foreign to my Anglicized ears. And not just from the crew, which was to be expected. Lots of my fellow passengers were not primarily English speakers.

People's bodies on the cruise ran from the obviously obese to the impossibly svelte. Most of us inhabited the middle ground. I found my eyes constantly pulled toward my shipmates with the fantastic shapes as my female companions eyes were probably also drawn to the handsome officers of the cruise line. This “perk” is one of the unadvertised benefits of cruising.

Formal nights demonstrated that we ALL can clean up and look ravishing when the opportunity arises. I was fascinated by how GOOD almost everyone looked on those nights.

It was fun watching the growth of camaraderie amongst all the cruisers as the week progressed. We were a small, like-minded city for our week bouncing around in the Caribbean and the sense of family began to pervade the group as the time progressed. There was almost ALWAYS a smile or a friendly word between cruisers when they met during the course of the day. Even from the person who you might have walked across the street to avoid the week before.

It seems to be a consensus among fellow cruisers I've talked to that one week's cruising is about the ideal. Most of those I've chatted with are more than ready to return home after a week. I believe a 4-nighter is a little short and more than 7 days might be pushing the envelope. Of course this is just the opinion of myself and a few others I've talked to.

Too much of anything is always too much. Food. Sun. Crowds. Liquor. We all have our saturation points or the place where the next bite of rich food isn't pleasant any more, the next drink isn't as satisfying, the next line you have to stand in not at all acceptable. For some it comes early, for others, later. But it always seems to eventually come.

I, and my wife, adore all the pampering we get on a cruise. It will be surely missed. Having your bed made daily, having it turned down nightly, having a thousand dedicated folks whose entire reason for being on the ship is to provide for your comfort and ease and satisfaction is a wonderful, wonderful thing.

Stuff costs more at sea. Always. If you didn't bring it with you, be prepared to shell out for it.

For every winner in the casino, for every bingo winner and cruise winner and whatever, there are LOTS of us others that support them. And support the crew. And provide a fine living for the executives of the cruise line. The cruise industry is NOT a charity!

A lot of the folks you bump into on the cruise ship are richer than you. Some are a LOT richer. They can afford the big bets in the casino and all the Carnival-sponsored island excursions. Easily. Some others you see aboard save a long, long time to afford the cruise they are on. There is NO average cruiser.

It'll take you a while to get your sea legs. About as soon as you accomplish this, your cruise will be over and you'll have to acquire your land legs again. This is another law of the cruise. As a side note, I wonder how long it will take before I can eat a meal and not expect the room to slowly tilt from side to side. Or when will I adjust to a bed that doesn't gently rock me to sleep every night.

Cruising isn't for everyone. But you owe it to yourself to give it a try before dismissing the idea. If it turns out to not be for you, then you learned something. But if you like it? Then you've probably gained a life-long obsession for the cruising life. I know Judy and I have.

Full Circle Fish

Full Circle Fish

Today was an early March Friday at the tail end of this strangely no-so-cold winter in my little town. It was warmer than normal today, by a handful of degrees, which seemed to be the norm for this winter. I've seen people remark about our crazy winter fairly often over the past few months, but I haven't seen anyone break down and start sobbing that they've really, really missed the freezing temperatures, icy roadways or mountains of snow we've had in the past. Believe me when I say I've enjoyed this warm winter a lot. I'm enough a believer in karma and what goes around, comes around to figure we'll probably pay for our good luck down the road, but that'll be a subject for another blog.

Since it was Friday there were certain things that I did which were habit for me on the last day of the work week. First off I visited my gym and went through the last of my thrice-weekly efforts of raising a sweat, breathing hard and working muscles that are reticent about having to do those tasks. I finished my hour amongst my fellow huffing and puffing oldies and then sat to dry the sweat. It was then 11:30, so I changed my shoes to go outside to the car. Next stop was the library where I perused the DVD's and eyed the rack of new books. After making some selections I ambled upstairs to grab a magazine and page through it to kill some time while I waited for the noon hour to arrive. At that point I would walk across the street to our “Friday” restaurant and meet my wife for lunch.

As I sat there eying the magazine, my mind wandered here and there and finally settled on the topic of my upcoming lunch. I think my stomach was instrumental in my mind's decision to go there as it was reminding me that it had been simply AGES since we'd had anything pass our lips that resembled food. I reminded my stomach that it had been less than four hours and that he could just tough it out for another dozen minutes or so. He rumbled his noisy acceptance and I again thought about my upcoming lunch.

I've mentioned in previous blogs about my wife's and my Friday inclination to eat at a particular restaurant and my specific inclination to partake of that institution's normally memorable fried fish dinner. I'd also previously mentioned on how darn great that meal usually was, how the fish was fried to perfection, golden and crunchy with cornmeal on the outside with flaky, hot and juicy meat inside. How you could pick up one of the fillets and dip in into the creamy tartar sauce and how the hot oil would run down your chin as you savored the delicious bite.

I always considered those fish lunches as something special.

I also mentioned earlier that sometime last summer the toothsomeness of the fish dinner had begun to decline and, unfortunately it wasn't a gradual diminishing of tastiness. It was a precipitous decline, a veritable fall-off-the-cliff decline in the aforementioned fish's “yum” factor.

It's quality had gone from either the best fish in town or, at worst, equal to the best in town to a definite also-ran.

It was sad and I had mentioned it to the owner. He stated that he was aware of the problem and was diligently working toward a resolution. Of course he neither had the time during the noon rush nor the inclination to go into details to his customers as to the reason for the fishy failures. I assumed he was apparently working toward a solution and let it go at that.

For a number of Fridays after that I ordered from other parts of the menu. The food was good but the fish, which I occasionally retried, simply wasn't. From some conversations during that period I found that I wasn't the only person who'd noticed the difference. It was all so sad.

I suppose I should state for the record that I'm not a gourmet or a gourmand. Apparently there is a difference. Nor am I a professional food critic although I watch 'em on TV and enjoy their antics.

I am, perhaps, in the food-judging arena, more like Popeye the Sailor Man – I yam what I yam. Or, in my case, I know what I like.

And I didn't like the fish anymore. Dammit!

I still liked the other stuff on the menu. The sandwiches, the breakfast stuff, the soups and salads. I still liked the staff and the owners. My wife's and my comfort level there was still quite high, so we still frequented the establishment most Fridays.

But the fish... Dammit!

We would occasionally sneak off on a Friday and partake of other restaurant's offerings and I would try their fish. It was generally good, some even quite good. But it wasn't the same. It just wasn't the same. I toyed with the idea of abandoning our fav and staking out another but never quite did.

Then, a couple weeks ago, the owner of our Friday place flagged me down as I was leaving his restaurant and told me to try the fish again on my next visit. “Just tell the waitress to give ya a free piece on me,” he'd said.

I'd looked at him askance as if to say that we'd gone down that road before and things hadn't improved much. If at all.

He again told me to give it another shot.

I agreed to take him up on his offer and headed out the door.

The next week I decided to go ahead and give 'er another try, so I ordered the fish special. I was a little apprehensive as the owner's last effort(s) to “fix” things had come up bust. But much to my delight, much to the satisfaction of my happy-again taste buds, the fish THIS time was GOOD. Doggone good! It was again moist and flaky on the inside and wonderfully golden and crunchy on the outside. It was just the same as I had remembered. We'd come full circle!

HURRAH!

I savored each bite and, when finished, mopped my oily lips in sated satisfaction as I smiled and smiled.

So today when I walked across the street to my again favorite Friday restaurant there was a bit of an unaccustomed spring in my step and a bit of an unaccustomed gleam in my eye that had nothing to do with the weather. I was going to eat fish again and it was going to be good

And you know what?

It was!

A Sense of Place

A Sense of Place

I usually start my Friday mornings by getting up somewhere around 9 or 9:30. I work second shift and don't get to sleep until 1:30 or so in the morning, so getting up that late isn't really such a sign of laziness. After my morning ablutions and maybe a quick bite to eat, I usually check my email, see if anyone put anything out on Facebook that needs a response, then grab my mp3 player and headphones and drive on down to the gym. I try to get in a bit of a workout on Monday, Wednesday and Friday most weeks. If I miss one I generally don't feel as well physically and people say I get cranky. I'm not a big fan of “cranky”, so I make a real effort to keep to the schedule. I do my workout at the local community center and exercise in the room they have there for that purpose. It's specifically allocated for seniors, 50 and older, so I know I won't have to “compete” with the younger crowd who are so much more competitive in their exercising. At the community center it's much more laid back and easy going, with lots of gossiping between us ol' fogies as we sweat and strain our muscles. The exercise room has a number of treadmills, bikes, weight machines of various kinds and even some dumbbells. I nod to the familiar faces on the exercise machines and go through my routine. I try to put my mind elsewhere by listening to some classic rock on my mp3 player while my muscles warm up and my generally always achy lower back gets a bit happier. About an hour later I'm usually finished and ready for a trip to the local library where I'll look over the newer books and DVDs. After that it will be lunch with my wife at one of our favorite lunch spots directly across the street from the library.

On this particular Friday I'd completed my workout at the gym and had made my way the three blocks to the library. I'd selected a movie to peruse that weekend and a new book to keep me company next week at work during the quieter periods of my evenings. I'd settled into one of the overstuffed chairs in the ground floor near one of the large windows that faced to the north and settled in to wait for the noon hour when I'd cross the street and meet my wife for lunch.

As I gazed out the window at the street scene in front of me, my mind wandered a bit and I began to reflect on the ground where this new library sat. The building was a fairly new edifice, only a couple years old, and sat on most of a full block in the downtown area of the city where I live. I am a big fan of this library. I use it a lot and enjoy the way the building was designed. Hell, I'd even had a chance to vote on the architectural design of the building myself. They'd had models of some possible building configurations set up at the old library and the people of the city were encouraged to vote for their favorite. (My vote ended up being the one chosen!) The new library needed to be built for several reasons. The old one had flat run out of space to contain the myriad new technologies that a modern library had to have including internet capabilities, genealogy, audio-visual, periodical and loads of other needs. It had many building failings including the heating and cooling system and was loaded with asbestos. Plus it had never had adequate parking.

Ever.

It sat on the same site as the old Carnegie library that had served my hometown up until the '60's or so and was land-locked in all directions, so expansion was never really an option. The new library, contrary to what some acquaintances of mine insist, was definitely needed.

An issue was placed on the ballot one year and the funds for a new library were allocated.

Soon after the vote was taken a block was selected in the downtown area and the businesses that sat there at the time were bought out. I believe the city used eminent domain to accomplish this. The buildings were eventually demolished and the block was cleared for the construction of the library.

For those of us anticipating “our” new library building, it seemed to take ages to construct. Eventually, however, the place was completed and it ended up being generally everything we desired. Lots of room inside, plenty of computers to use, a large genealogy department, a huge children's department downstairs, meeting rooms, a teen area, plenty of shelving and room to grow. Oh, and lots and lots of parking! It was ideal.

Anyhow...

As I sat in the library in my comfy chair looking out the window, I began to daydream about the stores and businesses that had stood within feet of where I now rested. About 50 feet east of where I sat I remembered there used to be a restaurant that I often frequented, a place called Nadeline's. It was a landmark in town as I remember and I recall going there late in the evenings as a teenager with friends and having pie and coffee. They had the best doggone cherry pie! And a wonderful sandwich called, appropriately, The Nadelburger! They also had those individual jukeboxes at each table and we'd play some of the current tunes when we'd congregate there. I think it was a dime a song or three for a quarter. It was a great hangout spot!

On the corner north of Nadeline's sat Dick's Camera Shop. I recalled when Dick Quicci's shop used to be about a half-mile further east, over on Pittsburgh Avenue. My friend Bill and I bought a couple of the first Polaroid Swinger Cameras in our hometown from him back in the early '60's. They took black-and-white photos, of course, but they were instant developing and were loads of fun. Lots of memories there and I still have some of those old snapshots.

About a half-block to the west used to sit the old Hobby Shop. Anytime any of my friends or myself wanted to get anything to do with a hobby, we went there – model trains, cars and airplanes, hobby paint, you name it – he had it. It was owned by a gentleman named R. G. Zimmerman. He used to tease us kids that the R and G stood for Real Good! Still don't know if that's true or not, but I really doubt it Above the Hobby Shop there was an apartment and, according to what my parents used to say, that was the first place they lived after they got married back in June of '46. I also know that it was my first home too, from my birth up to the early '50's when they moved to an old farmhouse about a dozen miles to the north of town.

The county liquor store also sat on that block and I'd pop in there when some “hard stuff” was needed on the shelf at home when I was of age.

There were lots of memories floating through my mind of the now nonexistent places whose ghosts stood all around me as I sat in my comfortable chair in the library.

And, in that very moment of reminiscing about the past, I felt such a sense of place that it was almost overwhelming. This was my home, this chair, this block, this city. I felt as firmly rooted there that moment as the old maples and oaks and sycamores that still stand all over the city. I felt as much in place and as comfortable sitting there as an old dog does sitting at his master's feet in front of a crackling fire.

This was MY place. At that moment I fit in there and belonged there as well as the last piece of an intricate jigsaw puzzle fits into the hole that awaits it on the tabletop. Any direction that I looked I saw my history. I remember THAT place and THAT place and THAT place over there. I did this there and those things over there. I'd eaten, shopped, bowled, drank, met friends, made friends, laughed, cried, kissed my first girl, drove my first car, made many mistakes and hopefully achieved many more triumphs right here. Right here! I'd walked, biked and driven a dozen different cars down those exact streets. I was born about 3 blocks from here, had lived in several homes within a ten-minute walk, had gone to grade school and high school just up the road. I'd attended college a block to the east and had married a mile across town. My son was born just up the road. My home for the past 32 years was a seven-minute walk to the north.

This was my place and I could feel that fact in my very bones and sinews.

And all those thoughts and feelings and emotions of place came over me like a tidal wave, crashing into me and through me. And after the internal tsunami had subsided, I looked out through the window again with even more observant eyes. The still extant buildings across the street were all familiar, all in their appointed places. The restaurant where I was heading in a few minutes belonged on that corner. The owner inside knew me, the wait staff knew me, the busboy knew me, I could almost feel the texture of the seat where I'd soon sit and eat my lunch. Next door to the restaurant was a book store. I'd bought a massive picture book of my home town from a friend who had authored it and sold it there only last year. Further down the block was a building that use to house the trolley cars that trundled from my hometown up to Cleveland back in the early part of the last century. My father and grandfather had ridden them. Where the drugstore sat now used to stand a bowling alley where I'd rolled many frames and drank many beers.

It was all familiar, all known, all exactly right. All of a place.

My connections to almost everything in sight or mind was firm and tight and I drew comfort from those connections. I had a history and a relation to almost every brick and paving stone as far as I could see and I could tell a story about almost anything you could point to.

I soon gathered up my library materials and headed across the street for my lunch. I was greeted by a smile from Mike the owner as I knew I would be. My waiter brought our drinks without my having to tell him what we wanted. Another of the waitresses stopped and chatted a moment about the movie that I'd picked up at the library. She'd seen it and gave me her take on how good it was.

Soon my wife would arrive on her lunch hour from work and we'd chat and compare notes on the day.

And as I sat there in the familiar surroundings listening to the din of another Friday lunch hour surround me I again felt the wonderful sense of place and my part in it.

I'm sure the customers nearby wondered at the goofy smile on my face.

Requiscat in Pace, Kaffee Haus

Requiscat in Pace, Kaffee Haus

Back in the very early '70's, after I'd fulfilled my military obligation and had gone back to the factory I'd worked at before enlisting, I realized that being a factory worker wasn't something that I'd be satisfied with for the rest of my life. I began to search around for something else to get into and realized that I had the G.I. Bill available to me and that I could use it for money if I wanted to go to school.

But what did I want to study?

My training in the Air Force was in meteorology and I'd pretty much burned myself out at that in four years, so it would have to be something else. I thought that computers looked interesting and looked at a computer school in Akron. After touring the facility I'd decided to go there and had even gone to that school to start classes on the day I was supposed to. But when I arrived for my first class, the storefront that had housed the school was empty, totally deserted. The school was obviously closed. It had apparently happened sometime between the time I'd put down a deposit and the time I'd tried to start attending class. A few weeks, tops. Luckily I hadn't put much money down for the classes – perhaps less than $50, so I wasn't out much cash, but it was disheartening and humiliating to realize I'd been fleeced. I like to believe in my heart that the closing of the school was something that wasn't foreseen when I'd given the place my deposit, that it had gone belly-up abruptly, but that was probably just wishful thinking. I'd been hoodwinked, film-flammed and taken. I contacted the Better Business Bureau and found out that I was only one of a rather large number of erstwhile students who had been relieved of various amounts of money and not given any classes at all. They said my chances of recompense were virtually nil. They said I was lucky my loss was so small.

So I was again looking for a place to get some sort of education.

After some more research I realized that there was a quite respectable business college in my home town. For some reason I'd never considered going there. It had been in business for many, many years, had lots of respectable graduates who were all over the place in business and government, and it was a place which accepted and appreciated former G.I.'s. Plus they had classes in computer stuff!

I applied and was accepted.

I started my classes and attended there for about a year and a half, after which I graduated with a diploma in Computer Programming and Higher Accounting. I ended up with a sheepskin diploma and a job opportunity upon graduation.

All was well.

But this story isn't about my education after being in the military. It's actually about a place to eat.

So how do we get from a school to a restaurant? Let's continue on a bit further.

I ended up attending the business college two times, all told. The first time was an approximate 18 month period in the early '70's after which I earned a diploma. The second time was in the later '70's after the college had received accreditation and was allowed to award Associate Degrees in certain fields. I went back the second time around and ended up earning two Associate Degrees, one in Accounting and one in Business Administration. That time I attended evening classes. The first go-around was day classes.

But that still doesn't lead us to the place to eat does it? So let's carry on, shall we?

Since the first year-and-a-half's classes were all day affairs and conducted during the daytime, we were dismissed over the lunch hour and had to find places to eat. There were several choices close by, one a little place on the ground floor of the building the school was in, which we frequented often. Another we hit once in a while was at the local Newberry's five and dime store which had a lunch counter and pretty good lunches for low, low prices.

And the other place that we liked to go to was on the north end of town. We had to drive there, eat pretty fast, and get back to classes quickly, but we really liked the place. Sometimes we were a little late returning to classes on the days we ate there, but we weren't usually chastised for lateness by the school. We were paying our fees and tuition and that was the important fact at our school.

This restaurant in the north end was a Perkins Pancake House.

For those of you not familiar with the name, it is a chain of restaurants that originated in Cincinnati in 1958, franchised itself over the next 11 years and ended up having over 480 restaurants in 34 states and 5 Canadian provinces. The corporation is still doing business today albeit with fewer restaurants due to restructuring and the economy. Our Perkins did business as Perkins from 1969 until 1978 when it was sold and renamed “The Kaffee Haus”. It remained in business until just recently.

Back in my college days, when we would visit the restaurant for our quick lunches, we liked the fact that the breakfast menu was available all day. One of our particular treats up there was the blueberry waffle. It was a huge hot waffle with a big dollop of blueberry compote on top and finished off with a couple mounds of homemade whipped cream. It was a lot of calories, of course, but in those days we were young and could burn one off pretty quickly. A blueberry waffle and coffee was our good-to-go meal then. Our breakfast of champions, so to speak.

I can still smell the grainy waffle smell and the sweet, sweet odor of the blueberry and whipped cream.

The place was also interesting because of the artwork that was displayed there. From as far back as I could remember there were huge paintings on the walls of the restaurant, probably 7 or 8 as I recall. All were large paintings on canvas, some probably 3 foot by 3 foot, others up to 4 foot by 6 foot. All of them depicting scenes of my hometown's founding and pivotal events in its history. One showed a gentleman named August Imgard who was purportedly the first man to have a Christmas tree in America and was a citizen of our hometown. Another showed a wagon train heading across the Appalachians heading there. Still another showed the arrival of the first train and the festivities which welcomed it. Another one had a portrait of the Revolutionary War general who our town is named after and another had the portrait of the famous local Indian chief whose name is still commemorated in a stream that flows through town. They were surprising well done works, all obviously by the same amateur hand, all colorful and interesting in their own ways. I always enjoyed studying them as I'd wait for my food to arrive.

After college I rarely visited the establishment. My wife and I would go there occasionally, but not with any frequency.

About a dozen years or so ago, my wife and I began to make it a habit to eat breakfast out on Saturday mornings. It wasn't really a conscious decision. We just got into the habit of starting our weekend with someone else cooking our breakfasts. We'd eat at different restaurants around town, but more and more began gravitating to the Kaffee Haus. We became regulars after a while, and soon had a free and easy acquaintance with the wait staff. We liked the menu and were quite happy to spend an hour or so a week with the nice ladies who waited tables there. We had our favorites and enjoyed the chit-chat with them as they went about their duties.

But time doesn't stand still and the lady who owned the restaurant had gotten on in years and had grown tired of running it. She'd been in the restaurant business for 42 years and was ready to pull the plug.

So in late August of this year, the restaurant went on the auction block. The lady owner had tried to sell the business privately to someone who was interested in keeping it as a restaurant, and we'd all been rooting for that particular resolution, but she had been unable to do so.

The restaurant sold quickly I've heard.

And of course it didn't go to anyone interested in keeping it as a restaurant. In fact, it sold to the veterinary clinic next door. He wanted the property to expand his business.

The wrecking ball and backhoes took down the building a week or two ago. All that's left is a small patch of dirt with yellow construction tape around it. The footprint of the restaurant can still be seen in the dirt.

It's surprisingly small.

So, in the end, the life of this building can be counted as 42 years, give or take a month or two. Uncounted meals had been served and enjoyed there and many lives touched by the family that owned it and the loyal workers who spent some or most of their working lives there.

My wife and I are sad that it's gone. We miss the special recipe pancakes, the blueberry waffles. We miss the smiles of the waitresses and their small talk as they hustled to serve the meals. We miss the comfort of being a “regular” at a place that welcomed you.

We miss the Kaffee Haus.

We've since moved our Saturday breakfast business to a restaurant only a short distance from the old property. It's picked up a lot of the trade from the old place and is quite busy but it's not really the same. One of our favorite waitresses from the old place is even working there. We're glad she found a position so quickly. But it's still not the same.

I have no idea where the other ladies are today. I hope they found jobs and I wish all the staff well.

So another chapter in my hometown's history has come to an end. It also ends a chapter in my own history, one that stretches from my college days through my adult years and up to the present.

I drove by the site again today on my way to work. I looked to my left and saw the small sad patch of dirt sitting there like an accusation, like a sad commentary, like the socket of a tooth that had weakened in old age and had to be extracted.

I turned my face away, my eyes misting a bit with nostalgia, and drove on to work.

Arizona On My Mind

Arizona On My Mind

The early afternoon sun shone buttery yellow in a cornflower blue sky this past Sunday. The day was unusually warm and pleasant for a mid-autumn day in my little part of northeast Ohioland. I walked up the rising ground from the clubhouse toward the first tee at a local golf course then stood on the tee. I raised a hand to shade my eyes from the sun and gazed toward the first hole.

“What's the distance?” I asked my companion Ray.

“165 yards”, he replied glancing down at the scorecard in his hand as he wrote down our names with the stubby yellow pencil.

I fixed my steady brown eyes at the pin on the first hole and noted the fluttering of the flag. Wind a bit from left to right, I thought. I'll hit a full-swing five-iron a smidgen to the right and draw it slightly around. Piece of cake.

I placed the white Titlest golf ball on the tee and took my stance. I gazed to my left again at the hole to affix the sight-picture into my mind, looked back at the ball, waggled the Tommy Armor magnesium iron twice and took a smooth stroke. The ball leaped at the contact with the swinging iron and rose like a fighter jet boosting off the catapult of a carrier, rising sweetly into the bright blue sky and curving ever so slowly to the left before gently settling on the emerald putting surface. I smiled, stepped away from the tee box and said to Ray, “Your turn, partner.”

Of course that's the way I'd have liked to have it happen. That was the way I wished and hoped and tried to have it happen. And, of course, that's definitely not the way it did happen.

What actually happened was this: I was huffing and puffing like an aged steam engine and sweating bullets after climbing the rise to the first tee. I hadn't even touched a golf club for years so when I pulled the iron out of the bag it felt like it was the first time I'd ever done so. I'd even forgotten what brand the club was. I'd looked at the first hole and remembered the dozens if not hundreds of botched shots I'd made there over the years. So, with a thousand conflicting thoughts rumbling around in my head about swing, stance, head placement, ball placement, hand position, grip, backswing, power stroke and followthrough, I deftly pulled my first shot 30-degrees left and directly into the line of residences that sat over there.

Oh crap... out of bounds, I thought. But at least I didn't break any windows!

I could feel my cheeks burning redly with embarrasment as I quickly teed up a second ball and proceeded to top it about a hundred yards more-or-less toward the hole. I was laying three with still a wedge to the green. On this crappy little par 3. Lord... Lord... Lord.

Ray did much better, of course, and continued to do so the rest of the round.

Ray is my newest friend. He's also the husband of a dear, dear lady friend of my wife and myself. He's her second husband, her soul-mate and a guy I wish I'd known as long as I've known his wife Pam. He's also a much better golfer than I. I figured my only salvation on that Sunday was that he had not played for a number of years also.

I like Ray. He's a man of few pretenses. He is what he projects he is. He's not a braggart, but is a man who has done many interesting things. I enjoy listening to his stories, I enjoy being in his company and I enjoy his view on life itself. I'm even beginning to understand his political viewpoint on some issues.

A little.

I've spent the last couple of our meetings trying to place his face. He has one of those mugs that sorta remind you of someone else. Maybe president Truman on a good day? Perhaps John Lithgow in one of his earlier works? Or that actor that played that cop on that TV show... what's it called? The one where...? Hell, maybe he even reminds me of my 8^th grade science teacher.

In any event, he had a face that reflected a life well-lived and a joie de vivre about the years that lay ahead of him.

Did I mention yet that I liked him?

His wife was college buddy of mine, a bridesmaid at my wife's and my wedding, one of our best friends during young adulthood during her first marriage and someone I'd trust with the keys to my castle and the combination to my vault.

They were, in all respets, a great couple and I loved being able to call them both friends.

I have no doubts, dear reader, that you'd like them too.

They've called Arizona their home for the past decade-and-a-half or so, in a small desert town not far from the spiritual Mecca and global power-spot of the crystal gazers and new-agers, the mystical Sedona. They're both retired now, Ray from a computer admin position with a well-known tourism company, Pam from a psychological therapist position at a nearby hospital. Since Ray's retirement was recent, they decided to grab their cat, bid adieu to their Arizona friends, fire up the GPS and drive their motorhome east to take the vacation they'd promised themselves for a long, long time. And to take care of some business in their old hometowns.

So early in September my phone rings and I hear Pam's voice saying, “We're here! We're here!” And so they were – parked in the driveway of her mom's house sat a beautiful large motorhome with colorful Arizona license plates.

My wife and I were just about to leave on our own vacation, so, as much as we hated it, we weren't able to get together with Pam and Ray for a couple of weeks. During that time period they accomplished a lot of the business they had to take care of and had visited with many relatives and friends. They'd even taken a short break and had driven to a campground “down the road” and had spent some quality time together alone, too.

Not long after my wife and I had returned from our vacation we finally had a chance to get together with our Arizona buddies. It was a simple movie and dinner outing, but the movie was quite good, the dinner was even better and the company was outstanding! We ended up back at their motor-home where we fiddled around on their laptop for a bit and yakked back and forth for a couple hours, catching up on what we'd been doing over the years and reminiscing a bit about the old days. During the conversation I said something about how Ray and I had never had the chance to “hit the links” like we'd said we'd like to and Pam had said, “How about you guys going tomorrow?”

I replied, “ Tomorrow is Monday and we have to work.”

My lovely wife interjected by saying, “No it isn't. Tomorrow is Sunday.” I'd seemed to have lost a day somewhere.

Dammit!

I paused a moment, realizing that my previous talk about my “vast” experience playing the game was about to bite me in the ass!

I gulped, accepted the fact that I'd been called in this particular poker game and said, “Sure. Sounds like fun.”

Not long after the date was made to play golf we retired to our house and left Ray and Pam alone with their kitty.

At home that night I went to our basement, gathered together my clubs and shoes and pondered on the upcoming match. I thought about the fact that Ray had went through surgery on an arm not too long ago. I thought about the fact that he had a pacemaker inserted not that long ago also. I added to that the fact that he hadn't played for a number of years.

And concluded, after all that calculation, that my ass was still probably toast.

As my luck would have it, the day was picture perfect, in fact it was one of a string of abnormally gorgeous days for that time of year. My hopes of a gully-washer that would cancel our outing and save my face were dashed.

Ray jumped into my car after I arrived at their motor-home the next morning with 3 golf clubs in his hand.

Three. Golf. Clubs.

I asked him if he might perhaps be a bit overburdened with the number of his golfing implements and he smiled.

“Ya only need three if ya know what yer doing,” he replied with a grin.

I recalled reading about how the golf pro Lee Trevino used to sucker opponents by playing with a Dr. Pepper bottle tied to a rope and using that instead of a club. And beating them soundly.

And Ray had THREE WHOLE CLUBS!

I was doomed.

You know from the beginning of this blog how the first hole started. I struggled with the first hole, took a snowman (an eight for the unenlightened) and walked doggedly to the second tee.

I suppose I could go on, hole to hole, and describe how we played. But that'd be really boring, wouldn't it? Suffice it to say that we had a great time and, miracle of miracles, my play even got a smidgen better. I wasn't even terribly disappointed with it overall after my gargantuan layoff. Ray even figured out his game a bit and played even better too. Granted that he had to make some adjustments to his game due to the constraints of his healing arm, but by the time a few holes had been played he was hitting them well. My short game was unsurprisingly abysmal and all our putts were short due to the slowness of the greens.

In the final accounting he beat my by a good margin, but I didn't care. We had a great time playing a game we both loved and had relished over the years and we seemed to find each other's company fairly enjoyable.

We shared a beer after the round and some pleasant conversation.

For the last gathering the four of us would have this trip around we ate a lunch at one of our favorite restaurants the following Tuesday. We were comfortable together and spent a nice hour-and-a-half eating, chatting and comparing notes on what we were planning over the next year or so. But all too soon it was time to say goodbye again. We walked to our cars and did our customary hugging and shaking hands, watching each other's eyes, imprinting our faces in each other's minds, holding on to the moment, remembering.

And then we walked away from each other and back into our lives.

So our friends are once again on the road, heading south, south, south and west, chasing the summer, keeping to the warmer climes, forsaking the cold and snow to follow the sun back to their snug harbor in the desert.

I wish you well, my friends. I wish you happy miles on the road, fascinating visits to new locales, good eats, new friends and a warm welcome when you return home.

And, to our friends Ray and Pam, until the next time we meet, all our very, very best.

Jealousy

Jealousy

OK, I admit it. Despite trying not to be, I've become incredibly jealous.

“And what might you be jealous about?” the reader might ask. “What has initiated this green funk of jealousy and to who might it be directed?”

Before answering, I'd like to describe for you things that I'm envious of but which don't arouse actual jealousy in me.

For instance, I'm fascinated and envious of the masters of almost any craft or trade. To watch an expert in his field plying his craft is always a delight. My father and my brother are master electricians. They perform their trade with deft hands and consummate skill. The gene for this skill, which you might think is innate in our family, isn't – it skipped me. I've tried performing some of the activities I've seen them do so effortlessly and find my awkwardness around their tools of the trade disconcerting. I know that this is not my forte. Even the effortless way they cut wire, bend it and attach it to terminals is a thing of beauty. I find craftsmen in other trades also marvelous to observe. Carpenters bringing structure and utility out of simple boards, nails and screws; bakers creating masterful breads and pastries and other foodstuffs out of ingredients that in your hands might result in less-than-stellar creations; plumbers who can attach pipes and connectors together quickly, securely and make them function properly the first time and every time.

I am envious of their skills and dexterity.

Other things that pique my interest and envy are the artists who create beauty and majesty out of simple materials. Painters and sculptures and musicians come to mind immediately as the quintessential artists. Who among us hasn't gazed in awe at works created or performed by them?

But the avenue that's drawn my more-than-envy and that's caused me to slip into outright jealousy is writing and those that excel in it.

I fool around with putting words on paper from time to time. I'm definitely not a master in doing so. Perhaps a “beginner who has a smattering of raw talent and who derives pleasure out of the workmanlike placing of words in front of other words and trying to make them say something” might be more descriptive of what I do. And by spending the hours and hours pounding on a keyboard and struggling with making the end result not TOO embarrassing, I begin to appreciate more and more the masters of the game. There are authors that I enjoy so much that I literally have tears in my eyes reading some of their passages. There are others that amaze me with their imagination and their prodigiousness. And still others whose vocabulary and virtuosity with the language are incredible. I salute them as I read them, as a tyro in their world salutes the master.

And with that in mind, I'd like to salute another master at a subset of the writing craft.

Is this writer one who draws me to tears with his virtuosity in language? Is this author one whom I envy for the number of his tomes in the marketplace with his name on the covers? Is he one of the few whose name is a household icon? A King? A Koontz? A Twain or a Huxley or a Poe?

No.

This author plies his trade in what appears, to me at least, to be a venue where a lot of other folks are in evidence but in which few are notable. It's a field of writing that's become widespread recently and in which many people have tried their hands with only middling results. And in this particular niche I think his work is extraordinary. Even on one of his off days his quality remains excellent.

Who is this writer?

Well, I'd like to introduce you to, if you do not know of him otherwise, a gentleman named John Heald. The last name is pronounce as heeled, not held.

Mr. Heald is the Senior Cruise Director for Carnival Cruise Lines and he has become, in the past couple of years, one of its more public spokesman. He has accomplished this by writing a blog. And I think it's a craft he's been born to perform.

And why do I think this?

I subscribe to the school of thought that believes good writing is smooth, polished and clean. It reads easily and effortlessly. Good writing is as easy to read as a chocolate malt is easy to swallow. Good writing goes from the printed page into your brain almost unconsciously, the words as apt and precise as a surgeon's deftness with a scalpel.

But enough with the similies. John's blog conveys the man behind the keyboard to you as simply as his smiling picture conveys his visage. To read his blog is to know the man.

I've read certain blogs of his that would double me over in laughter at one moment and, in the next paragraph, make me as emotional as a child mourning a lost lollypop. He could raise my ire with one sentence and calm me with his next. He could describe a scene in almost grand poetic terms and in his next paragraph lapse into an almost Monty Pythonesque depiction of an event in hilarious British colloquialisms.

As you may have gathered, I just dote on reading John's blog.

I suppose some of my fascination with John Heald's blogging is that he's British. He takes pride in his Britishness and much of his writing reflects that heritage even as he attempts to keep his multicultural audience “in the know” by explaining most of his more oblique English references.

I've always been a bit of an Anglophile. British terms and phrases have always interested me. The Royal Family of Great Britain has always been fascinating and I am not ashamed to say I watched almost all of the recent Royal Wedding on television. I enjoyed seeing the pomp and circumstance of the ceremonies, the almost Gilbert-and-Sullivan-like uniforms of the military officers, the extravagance of the dress of the ladies and their ornate, ever-present hats, the rituals of the clergy and the almost palpable aura of royalty around the Queen and the Royal family. If I wasn't a proud and happy American, which I certainly am, I do sincerely believe I could easily be an equally happy subject of the Queen.

Some of Heald's readers have expressed their annoyance or dissatisfaction with some of the baser forms of his humor, but I always find those references and descriptions both funny and self-effacing from him. They make him three dimensional and human, a man whose diabetes and hemorrhoids are constant problems and whose underpants are a running gag. In counterpoint, his recounting of the fire on the Carnival Splendor late last year and how the crew responded is both fascinating, inspiring and a remarkable journal of the event – a must read if you ask me.

I think that allowing John to become the Brand Ambassador for the cruise line, either formally or informally, ended up being one of the best marketing decisions that the company may have ever made.

John, if nothing else is an “easy read” and, from me, that's the highest form of praise for a writer.

So, that being said, what say you give him a try? If you might be thinking about a cruise or have been on one before, all the better. He speaks the cruiser's language.

He's at www.johnhealdsblog.com. Go ahead and type it in right now.

And prepare yourself for a treat!

"Weren't You Once Named Billy Bass?"

“Weren't You Once Called Billy Bass?”

Memory is a doggone funny thing. If I cared to, I could sit here tonight and describe to you, in detail, an event that happened a half-century ago. I could tell you the people that were involved, the events that transpired, perhaps even the taste of the food that was served. I might even recall the conversations and how the people looked on that particular day. But ask me what happened the day before that event? Or the week after? Or maybe just a few weeks ago? It's almost a certainty that I'd draw a total blank. The mental fog that hangs around and conceals most of our yesterdays is as thick and opaque as an ice-coated windshield in January. But every once in a while during our normal humdrum life something is said or someone makes a remark that will suddenly connect some wires in the old cortex and, voila, something that was totally gone is... suddenly... back again. The fog is lifted and the frost is scraped away.

When I was a boy of nine or ten I was fortunate to have been exposed to the wonderful organization called the Boy Scouts of America. I had a number of childhood friends that had joined and listening to their stories of what the organization was all about and how much fun they were having in it galvanized me into deciding to join also. One of those kids who was instrumental in suggesting that I might be interested in the Scouts was a kid named Rick.

And this story is mostly about him.

Rick was and is a contemporary of mine, give or take a few months. We were both children of a post-WWII America – early members of what was to be later called the Baby Boomers or the Boomer Generation. We'd attended the same primary school in the early grades then had both shifted to another elementary school for our last year or two. We'd both been Patrol Boys where we performed crossing guard duties for the kids coming to school. We wore white Sam Browne belts and had badges proclaiming our status as “Patrol Boy”. We even shared a trip to Cleveland to watch the Indians play baseball with dozens (or was it hundreds?) of other patrol boys one summer. Those were back in the Rocky Colavito days, so it was a pretty big thing for us.

We shared a lot of the same teachers in the old grade school down in the “not so good” part of town where we lived and then shared others in the “further uptown” school we ended attending. Later we went to the same high school, which wasn't surprising as there was only one in our town in those days. We became fast friends somewhere in that time period and Rick became so common a visitor to my family's house as to be almost considered a family member, as I was at his home. Our mothers conversed with each other frequently and each took turns swatting the other one's kid when conditions warranted it, which they often did.

To make a long story short, we hung around together. A lot.

Somewhere in that time period Rick joined the Boy Scouts. And sometime after, some months perhaps, I followed. Rick had already progressed up the ranks a bit by the time I became involved, so he became a bit of a mentor or teacher to me. He helped me learn my knots, learn the Scout Oath and Law and all the formal “book learning” that had to be assimilated to become a Scout and to progress up the ranks. I took my brand new Boy Scout manual and virtually inhaled it, learning all the arcane camping knowledge and other scout skills that were described and illustrated in it's venerable pages. It wasn't long before we were the same rank and began to help each other learning the more advanced things that were necessary to reach the highest ranks and to work with each other to earn the merit badges that were also crucial. We were both aiming for the highest award that you can earn in the Scouts, the Eagle Scout award which we both attained a couple years later.

During that time period Rick and I also were passing through the excruciating time of life known as puberty. Well, at least I remember it as being pretty painful. He was the first to discover that girls weren't at all the icky creatures that we thought they were as little kids. The first to discover that there might be something about girls that was very interesting. Or maybe a whole lot interesting. I was a bit further behind in the maturation process and my interest in the fairer sex would blossom later on.

In those years Rick also started becoming what would euphemistically be called a “wild child”. He experimented with alcohol and tobacco and found that he liked both of them. In his early and middle high school years he ran with a rougher crowd and got into trouble from time to time. I followed a bit in his steps then but only to a lesser degree.

Rick fell in love as a Junior in high school with a senior girl, quit school and married her. I lost track of him a little before that period. I'd heard he'd changed his name also. Maybe. Everything was rumors.

And Rick gradually faded into memory; not forgotten but put away on a shelf somewhere, to be, perhaps, dusted off and peered at sometime down the road.

Now, faithful reader, let's leave the wonderful world of the early '60's and move onward and forward. Let's wend our way through the '70's, '80's, '90's and oughts. In fact, let's jump clear up to today. And let's bring into the discussion one of the social miracles of this time and age – Facebook.

So I'm on the computer a month or two ago and I suddenly get a message on Facebook from someone who asked the oddest question. It queried, “Were you once known as Billy Bass?”

Now the answer to that question is yes and the origin of the moniker that used to be applied to me goes way, way back, but the number of people who might even know to ask the question are extremely limited. I can think of three or four, of which most are deceased. I looked at the name of the sender and it's familiar... kinda. The first name is Rick and that seems right for the fuzzy idea that's buzzing around in my head but the last name is... not correct with the first one. But... it might be. Something about a name change? The owner's picture is there but it's current and I recognized nothing about it.

I thought a bit about my hypothesis, then wrote back, “Did you used to have a different last name?”

His reply was in the affirmative and, suddenly, I was sure of who I was talking to. This had to be Rick, my old friend from my late-childhood-and-early-teen years. My old mentor, teacher, friend and near-brother from the distant past. Rick. I'll be damned if it wasn't Rick!

We messaged back and forth a bit on FB and I found out that he was back in our hometown on a visit right that moment. He was here with his wife and their motor-home, was right up the road in a campground close by and he wanted to get together and share some memories! Would I be interested?

I was bemused, flattered and enthusiastic. Of course I'd like to get together!

So a meeting was planned for the following Saturday at my house. A mutual friend of ours was contacted and was planning to attend but an emergency precluded that from happening.

So on Saturday afternoon an unfamiliar car pulled into my driveway, two people exited and approached me as my wife and I waited in the yard. I observed the couple as they drew nearer. Rick's wife Ginny was a petite lady, light-colored hair, a pretty face and a nice smile. I liked her immediately. Rick himself was a man of approximately my size with chestnut-colored-slightly-beginning-to-gray hair worn long with a ponytail, glasses and some facial hair. He looked slightly similar to the magician/comedian Penn Jillete from the team of Penn and Teller. (He'll probably hate this association.) He was dressed casually as I was and I saw a tattoo on his forearm.

We shook hands, introduced our wives to each other and adjourned to my living room.

And we talked. And talked and talked and talked. There was so much ground to cover, so much time since we'd seen each other. We jabbered on and on about our lives, children, homes, activities and families. We reminisced about our memories of our times together as kids and young adults, what we did, what happened, what happened then and what happened later on. And as we talked, many memories that I didn't even realize I still possessed came flooding back. Camping trips, our folks, brothers, girlfriends and other poignant memories from the days when Eisenhower was president, the moon landing was a decade in the future and life was both much, much easier and much, much harder depending on one's viewpoint and one's circumstance.

And all through the conversations and reminiscing I watched Rick and listened to Rick and began to see the Rick I remembered. He was still there. The gestures, the way he put words together, his inflections and the tone of his voice. And more and more I could see the good-looking tough kid that was imprinted in my memories. And after he left I could hear his voice echoing in my mind and the old Rick came booming in loud and clear. Yes, I said to myself. That's exactly how he sounded and that's exactly how he looked and that's exactly how he smiled and laughed and acted.

It was as if my memories of the teen-age Rick and my present views of the extant Rick were blending and melding and metamorphosing into the man who had stood before me shortly before. My brain had gone through a million computations and finally done the mental gymnastics which had interspersed the in-between Ricks from then until now. And at last he stood revealed in my mind, the 3.1 model Rick, the latest generation, the updated and improved model of the Rick from the old days.

And it was soooo, soooo cool!

I stopped in to visit with him and Ginny two days later in their marvelous motor-home at the campground north of our hometown. We visited some more and they shared their scrapbooks and memories of their many journeys in the motor-home They'd been, at least to my parochial eyes, almost everywhere and had seen so, so much. Especially since they'd retired and “hit the road” for many months of the year.

And it was comfortable and welcoming sitting in their cozy home on wheels and listening to their voices and listening to the soothing thrumming of the early autumnal rain as it beat on the steel roof above our heads.

And on that day and in that place I realized that my old friend, my old compadre from the long, long ago was back in my life.

And I smiled.