Memory Lane - From Mary Edna to Merry Christmas (August to December 1985)

In my last post I reported that Cathy spent much of her first month in the family learning how to vacation. If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you know how important those lessons would be to her coming childhood. But it was soon time to move on as a major event in our extended family was about to take place. The celebration of Mary Edna McKellar's 100th birthday in London, Ontario. Mary Edna, better known as Nana, was Nancy's maternal grandmother.

Though at that time I had only been in the LeRoy-McKellar family for a little over five years, my mind was already repleat with Nana stories. Stories I had heard from Nancy and her cousins, like the all-day outdoor church gatherings Nana favored, the loving but sometimes mercurial relationships she had with her sons-in-law Rae and Ken, and the summer retreats she treated Nancy and her cousins Lynne and Ann to at a posh resort in Southhampton. 

Then there were the stories I experienced personally. Like Nana just after meeting me announcing that she would be referring to me as Charles because "Chuck" sounded like a piece of meat. Or the time she shushed me roundly for asking how she felt about becoming a centenarian (in retrospect a shushing that was well deserved). 

There are many more stories as you may imagine, and some no doubt will appear later in this blog. But this story is about her grand day. Here are some pics. First the birthday girl in her party dress, prim and proper as always.

In this next pic a gentleman from the Bank of Montreal is paying his respects. 

The gentleman was there to recognize and honor Nana's status as both the oldest pensioner of the bank and the person who had drawn a pension from the bank for the longest time - 55 years. Nancy's grandfather John Alexander McKellar (known as J.A. in the family) passed away suddenly in 1930, when Nana was 45. She inherited his pension rights.

An interesting sidenote to the day was learning that the gentleman from the bank was currently living in the house Nana had lived in during the late '40s and early '50s. The discovery came as the two were discussing Nana's days in London.

One subject that came up during their exchange was an indelible black stain on one of the house's hardwood floors. The man from the bank was curious as to its origin. Nana was unabashed as she related the story of Nancy's brother David at age three tampering with a bottle of India ink and in the process spilling some on the floor. Efforts to remove the stain proved futile. So the stain, and now the secret of its origin, were passed on to the new owners.

As you may expect multiple generations were there to join in the festivities. Foremost were Nana's daughters, Evelyn and Marge (Nancy's mother) seen here enjoying the formal part of the program. Evelyn is reading from the many cards and letters Nana received congratulating her on her 100th birthday and wishing her well, one of which was from Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. 

In this shot with Marge you can see that despite her usually reserved disposition, Nana still enjoyed a good laugh.

Accompanying the daughters were their spouses, Evelyn's husband Ken on the left below and Nancy's father Rae.  

These two stout-hearted souls were well-regarded for their deft management of the tricky responsibilities of sons-in-law. In this department, I have a certain amount of experience. And from my observations over the years, I would say that occasionally Mary Edna was a challenge. But with charm and grace, and a measure of discretion, Ken and Rae always came through those "crises of the moment" with flying colors. I learned a lot about being an "out-law" (not in the blood line) from watching these two masters.

The next generation was also well-represented at this momentous event. Here we have my bride Nancy shown with Evelyn's daughter Lynne and Lynne's daughter Heather. 

Evelyn's other daughter Ann.

And Nancy's brother David with his bride Barbara and younger son Matthew.

Taking in this megadose of family were several members of the fourth generation. All well-behaved, as I remember. To be expected, of course, of a family with such dignified roots. Here are great granddaughters Christine and Heather in their party finery.

 And my son Ted offering his respects.

In this classic shot we have the oldest and youngest members of the family sharing a moment, 100 years apart on their individual life timelines.

Of course there was a lot of hobnobbing between and amongst generations, and generous amounts of food and drink as evinced by this casual shot of the dinner.

As always with such gatherings, group photos were in the plan. Here are a couple. The first is of the fourth generation.

In the back row from left to right are my son Ted holding Cathy, and Dave and Barb's sons Matt and Brian. In the foreground are Christine, Heather and Heather's little brother Andrew. You will continue to see these cherubic faces in future posts as I make my way through our pictures from the '80s and '90s. Because of the family's long-standing ties to Ipperwash Beach, these international second cousins shared numerous childhood experiences.

And here is a shot of the full entourage. This rare assemblage is captioned below. 

Here goes. From left to right-ish - Ann, Ted, Evelyn, Christine (next to Ted), Ken, Matt and Heather (in front), Barb, Brian, David, Tom (back row), Nana, Lynne holding Andrew (next to Nana), yours truly (behind Lynne), Rae, Marge, and Nancy holding Cathy (in front).

 

In this last shot from the day, taken as we were preparing to leave, I can just hear the five-week old Cathy thinking, "What was that all about ? Who are all those people?" 

Curiousity would eventually reveal itself as one of her defining characteristics.

Spent from the buildup to Nana's big day and the actual event, the Burk-LeRoy members of the family returned to Ipperwash for a few more days before the end of summer and the beginning of the fall routine. The kids returned to the beach.

Except the littlest one. She continued to work the puzzle of her surroundings from her usual perch. You can sorta tell she's beginning to work a few things out.

The "boys" worked in a final sail.

And the girls took their final quiet moments at the water's edge.

Having dotted all the "i"s and crossed all the "t"s of another Ipperwash summer, Nancy and I packed up our big blue Oldsmobile and headed back home to Dearborn.

As we settled into our fall routine of early rising, shuttling kids to and from child care, long hours at work and preparing the house and yard for winter, our poor little camera spent most of its time in its case. We did dust it off on the usual occasions to document family events. Here are a few pics.

Halloween really couldn't pass without a shot of the kid's costumes. Here's Christine in her new pumpkin outfit. From the expression on her face, it looks like she's thinking "Really?" 

We spared no expense (literally no expense) to dress Cathy up as a baby in a car seat. Despite our efforts, she was totally bored. More like, zonked out. As a result she wasn't much help passing out candy to trick-or-treaters.

         

In November we spent a relaxing weekend with my parents Wendell and Dolores in Linwood. We found them in good spirits and looking forward to spending time with their grandchildren. 

The puppy on my Dad's arm was named BB (short for Black Beauty). At least I think it was BB. They had two little black dogs around that time. This could be Sammy.

The kids were happy to see their grandparents and to play with those special toys my parents kept for them.  

One of those old toys was this castle set that served for 20-plus years of visits.

Back home for Thanksgiving we celebrated in the usual way. Gluttony, capped off with even more gluttony later that evening. Here's a shot of the star of the show, in the midst of that dreaded ritual known as carving. Noteworthy that this is the first turkey Cathy ever met. 

And a picture of Cathy after the gluttony, reacting pretty much as the rest of us usually did. Too much treptophan can be a wonderful thing. 

Rounding out the year and this post was Christmas, with the usual and always uplifting activities. Like Christine's first Christmas morning with a baby sister, and Cathy's first Christmas morning - period. Some pretty wide eyes there.

Christine was thrilled with a fancy new party dress, bespeaking her refined ancestry (remember Nana?).

Cathy was again just trying to figure it all out. Hoping she wouldn't fall out of her chair.

Later in the day, we headed over to Dave and Barb's home in Ann Arbor for our traditional family gathering. Here's a shot of the McKellar girls in their finery.

And a shot after cocktails and dinner, of happy people piling on the sofa with Grandpa LeRoy. It was a fun ending to a fine day. And our last photo of 1985.

Except for these two rare pics I stumbled onto some time later. While we were celebrating in Michigan that year, my parents had journeyed to Florida to spend the holidays with my grandmother Katy in Tampa. In the '80s and 90's before my parents relocated to Florida, they would visit my grandmother several times a year to check up on her and enjoy the warm weather. 

Part of that holiday visit in '85 apparently included a New Year's Eve party. These pics appear to be in my grandmother's home. This first one is of my parents, Wendell and Dolores.

This second pick is of my mother and grandmother toasting in the new year. At 81, my grandmother was a happy, hardy and generous soul. She continued to celebrate New Year's Eves for another 18 years. 

That about does it for 1985. When next I return to Memory Lane, we'll see what 1986 had in store for the Burk family. Until then.

Grosse Pointe Charles

Memory Lane - Cathy Meets Avon Rae (August 1985)

When I last stepped off Memory Lane, daughter Cathy had just arrived. Here she is on her first day home, still sleeping off the happy event.

But being the active family that we are, we soon strapped Cathy into the Delta 88 and headed back to Avon Rae, our family cottage on Ipperwash Beach in Ontario. 

The thrill of a new baby sister didn't diminish Ted and Christy's enthusiasm for sand and surf.

We were sure Cathy was enthusiastic about the beach as well, but being only a week old she expressed most emotions reservedly. 

So while Cathy snoozed, the rest of us went about our usual summer fun. Frolicking in the lake,

And on the beach.

There was even a little quiet time.

And every so often we would check in on Cathy, who typically was doing this. 

Awake. Taking it all in. But not quite sure what all the hoopla was about.

In the midst of all the excitement of introducing Cathy to foreign travel, a strange thing happened. It had never happened before and to my knowledge never happened again. A little background.

At the time, Ipperwash Beach was an old and established neighborhood. Most of the cottages were owned by families that had known each other for generations. Our immediate neighbor to the north was no exception. Her name was Dotty Cavan. She was originally from Georgia and had made it to Ipperwash by way of her husband Jim. As a child Jim had spent summers at Ipperwash Beach with his family to escape the Georgia heat. He continued that tradition all of his life.

Sometime in the 70s after years of renting, Jim and Dotty bought the lot next to Avon Rae and built a cottage. As the lot next door was essentially a large sand dune, the new cottage sat about eight to ten feet higher than ours. And from its elevated deck, one could see directly down into Avon Rae's large screen porch where our family happy hours took place.

Jim passed away in the early 80s, but Dotty continued returning to Ipperwash for the summer months. During that time she would occasionally join us in the lake for our traditional late afternoon family swim (the purpose of which was to work up an adequate thirst for the tradition that followed). And once or twice Dotty actually came down and joined us in our happy hour fun. But mostly she would keep to herself and follow (or perhaps be annoyed by) the rabble rousing on our veranda below.

But this year, Dotty broke with tradition and decided to invite us all up to her cottage for a happy hour. Being a teetotaler, Dotty found herself in new territory. She was perfectly prepared for the social side of happy hour. Pleasant chit chat about the day's events, proper inquiries into the state of everyone's health, and the usual retelling of stories and remembrances from past good times. 

She was also ably prepared with snacks and munchies to prime our palates for the fuel that drives happy hour - alcohol. It was regarding this final component - the centerpiece of the ritual - where things went a tad awry. Not experienced in the ways of grapes or hops or distilled spirits, Dotty felt any old form of alcohol would do. Unfortunately, the form she chose was an awful off-brand of - dare I say beer? Tasted like it was brewed in a rusty burn barrel.

But, what could we do? This extremely pleasant old friend had put herself out to accommodate our (to her) strange ways. She'd prepared the venue and the menu and purchased a case of what she thought was a libation suitable for the occasion. So we embraced the situation with smiles, took pleasure in the company, and drank as little as social grace would allow. As we were a bit off our game, there were only a few photos taken. But, they captured the moment. 

In this first one, we have Nancy's Aunt Evelyn (normally a gin and tonic drinker) sitting with Nancy's parents Rae and Marge (normally Manhattan drinkers). Note that all three have a glass of brown...uh...stuff. 

Here we have Nancy's Uncle Ken (also a gin and tonic drinker) with a glass of the same brown stuff.

Finally, our host Dotty in all of her hosting glory.

If you look closely you'll see that Dotty does not have brown stuff in her glass. I'm pretty sure it's ice water. No flies on Dotty. 

Despite the unusual liquid refreshment, we all had a great time at this our one and only happy hour gathering up on Dotty's hill. We drank the stuff without puckering too badly and enjoyed her southern drawl and finely-developed sense of humor. And to this day during our afternoon cocktails we often find ourselves revisiting the story of "Dotty's happy hour". 

Now back to Cathy and foreign travel. As the first few weeks of her life unfolded, Cathy adapted nicely to life on the road. She received frequent counseling from an informed source on the virtues of cottage life.

 Spent a lot of time contemplating what she'd been told.

And when she needed a little private time, she would let us know.

And while Cathy was napping, Ted and Christy went about their business. Outdoors.

And indoors.

Eventually, Cathy escaped her table cradle and joined the other kids on the sofa for a group photo. Their first. 

Before that August visit to Avon Rae was over, we had a couple of birthdays to celebrate. First was Christy's on the 20th, launched with a little presents frenzy.

Here she is modeling her new jacket.

We eventually got to the obligatory baked goods. 

And the payoff.

The following day we did it again for Ted, starting with some nifty gifts.

More baked goods, with a few more candles.

And a successful completion of the make-a-wish ritual.

It should be noted that there was another guest at both of these parties, appropriately attired and definitely paying attention. And slowly realizing that there's more to life than laps and naps. Just wait until next year.

Exhausted from extensive celebrating, what better way to relax than to head back to the beach for one last day in the sun. Everybody played.

So ended Cathy's introduction to cottage life and Lake Huron. She didn't say much about the experience, but I think she liked it.

Next time, Cathy meets the Canadians. A lot of them. Until then.

Grosse Pointe Charles