ride...ride like the wind

I road my bike like a good girl today. I love riding it. It's like swimming. I feel weightless. The wond blowing in my hair, sometimes I even let go of the handlebars. I remember my first bike, a blue spider bike, with a white banana seat! Man I was stylin. Of course it wasn't the more expensive green Schwinn that other people had. My parents would never pay for a Schwinn. I am not sure but it could have been a Huffy! I loved that bike. It served me very well. Lenore and I would ride to my Gram's house in the city on that thing. Her on the handle bars.....except when she would fly off!
I loved those secret trips down 79th street to see Elsie. She was always happy for the company and she never to my Mom. She would feed us, make us laugh, sit and chit chat, sometimes send us to the store for her, and then remind us that it was getting late and my Mom would be home soon. My Gram lived on 81st and Marshfield (Little Flower, I believe) in Chicago, we lived on 82nd and Central in Burbank, quite the ride for two kids on one bike!
Elsie was the greatest. She never told on you....never. She always made u breakfast or whatever u wanted, you could stay up all night and sleep all day. She smelled like coty face powder, she smoked and drank beer, although I don't ever remember her smelling like either. Maybe the smell of Vicks vapo rub over powered the beer smell. I loved her. I still do. I miss her, too.
Wherever u r Gram, I hope you can see me and my family and how well we all turned out.
Your genes gave me the stamina to survive.

Summers end approaches

As much as I love the Fall and the kaleidoscope of color it brings, I am not ready for Summer to end. This Summer especially. The weather has been so mild, too mild and now in the mid-section of August it is actually turning into the sauna that says "Ahhh Summer in Chicago"
It is making me want to go to Block parties and "Fests", except their numbers are dwindling and I have NO time to take off and enjoy them. I went to ONE farmers market and that was in May! I have not yet visited my local "Super Sweet Corn" farmstand guy at all!!!! My garden is flourishing but some plants are starting to turn to seed. I would like to have a day with my friends at a WINNING Cubs game. I would like to have a dinner party and drink lots of wine on my patio, I would like to eat Al Fresco at a quaint Bistro. I want to stay home like Matt and re-finish furniture! Ok, tonight I am making some plans! I will finish Summer with a bang, I will have a killer tan, I will drink wine on the patio....after work!

sis

So I spent part of my day yesterday with my sister and her family, along with my daughter and grandkids. Talk about something to be depressed about. My poor 58 year old sister is dwindling away in a nursing home in Des Plaines (we live in the far southwest suburbs). She has MS (like my mom) although it's not the reason she is there it contributes to the difficulties she has had. She fell over a year and a half ago and promptly went into a nursing rehab place. Well they let her sit in a wheel chair for hours a day and she developed large open bed sores. One thing has lead to another and now her muscles and tendons have atrophied and she is permanently disabled (she was walking with the aid of a cart on wheels before the fall). It's so sad, my sister was such a strong person, and she cooked and cleaned and went out. She loved to cook, she loved to eat, and now she weighs just over 100#'s and they are talking about a feeding tube to make sure she is getting the vitamins she needs. No one knows how awful it is for her, but we can imagine.So yesterday her daughters rented a van and picked her up to spend the day outside the home.Bittersweet. While I am sure she loved it, she is just going to want to do it more often and it is expensive, plus the logistics stink!