Two weeks ago, in the wee hours of the morning, my father unexpectedly passed away. He was 57, and it would be an understatement to say that my family is devastated by the loss. After a whirlwind trip to Maine, I'm back to the chaos of my day-to-day life, working hard to keep my head above water. I'm not ready to eulogize my father here yet but I'm going to work hard to spend more time here, documenting. One of my dad's most frequent complaints to me in the past year was that I was not writing here enough and while it's too late for him to read future entries, it's not too late for my to write them for other people in my life.

On the left is the Old. The Waldo-Hancock Bridge, built between 1929-1931. It was one of the first two bridges in the US to use Robinson and Steinman's prestressed twisted wire stand cables and the first bridge to use Vierendeel trusses in its towers (a later example of a bridge that used this design element is the Golden Gate in San Francisco). For most of my growing-up life, there was an osprey's nest on the top of the tower on the Verona side of the bridge (seen here). In recent years the bridge was deemed unsafe for the weight of modern traffic. They added to the structure to shore it up temporarily, but ultimately it was decided to push forward to build a new bridge, next to the old one.

That New bridge is the Penobscot Narrows Bridge and Observatory, on the right. It's a very interesting piece of engineering, with its cables down the center of the bridge deck, so that the traffic actually drives on lanes cantilevered out over the river below. There is an elevator that takes you up in the tower on the Waldo County side of the bridge where you can look out and see the mountains in the area as well as a beautiful view along the Penobscot River. It is a great vantage point for photos, and it makes for lovely, interesting photos itself:

Now, I like bridges. I like old bridges, I like new bridges, I am fascinated by the engineering work that makes them support (or not) the traffic that goes over them. But, I am highly sadden to see the old bridge go. The state in which it exists now is a much dilapidated shadow of the proud, green bridge we drove over to visit my grandfather, to get to Ellsworth to meet the bus that would take me back and forth to school my final two years of high school, to get to Blue Hill for soccer games or the Blue Hill Fair. And the preservationist and Lover of Old Things in me is devastated at the impending loss of this pioneering example of bridge engineering. I have not yet seen any kind of a plan for the old bridge, although I did search the internet to see if there were plans for a pedestrian bridge, or greenway, or the other kinds of things that old bridges tend to become. Once the paint is gone from a metal surface, the rate at which it corrodes snowballs, and the point where it becomes un-salvageable can happen in not much more than a blink of the eye.

Nanie loved the hummingbirds. It's been two years now.  I still miss her every day.

This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.
- F. D. Roosevelt

Nanie as a baby, 1921 or 22 I believe [she was born in 1921]

Today would have been the 87th birthday of a woman I loved dearly, a woman who in just three short years made an impact on my life so deep that her passing was one of the key catalysts in a total overhaul in regards to knowing who I am.

Long before I met Nanie, I had heard stories of her from her grandson, my most beloved husband. Nanie was TheBoy's maternal grandmother and growing up with a working mom, he had spent many many afternoons and evenings with her, eating corn and hamburgers and making chocolate pudding. She had a metal hamburger patty shaper and it was his job to press the meat into the ring to form neat, even burgers for their dinner (this ring now lives in our home, as both a precious artifact and also as useful tool).

When I moved to Oregon two short weeks before my 23rd birthday, Nanie (who I would not meet until nearly a month later) sent gifts to me via my husband's mother. They were totally random, but clearly showed me that I had been welcomed to the family even though my relationship with her grandson was still relatively new and untested. The gifts were powerful symbols to that effect.

Nanie and my mother-in-law, 1973

When I met Nanie, I was nervous. My grandparents were either a. long passed or b. distant geographically and I had not spent much time with members of their generation. I was (and to an extent still am) unsure of how to talk to and act around the elderly. My nervousness with Nanie melted away easily and I quickly began to understood what it meant to really have a grandparent who was close both emotionally and geographically. I cannot recommend it enough, and I am truly sad that I will never again have that same type of relationship with anyone else.

Nanie was a total spitfire. A fall down the stairs a few years back had lowered her mobility so we were frequently called upon to carry things down from her upstairs for her. She continued to go for walks as many days as the weather allowed, cheerfully pushing her bright red walker around her neighborhood in all but the worst of weather, her scotty dog Reggie by her side. Unfortunately I never got to meet Reggie as he passed on just before I moved here, but I hear he was as much a spitfire as she was.

Nanie was occasionally grumpy and always stubborn. She was fiercely devoted to her family and her friends and was always there to help us along when we hit a rough patch. She loved to entertain, although in the final year or so of her life her ability to do so was starting to diminish. Our family will never forget the Sunday Dinner at her house where she insisted on serving me a pressed turkey loaf. The rest of the family was eating ham, a food I patently disliked and although my mother-in-law tried to convince her to cook me a chicken breast, or a real turkey breast, she was insistent that this turkey loaf was the best option. Well, I can tell you, it was not. It was soggy, and covered in gravy, a food I am patently revolted by. I scraped the jelly-like gravy off politely and forced myself to choke down enough to pretend that I was full. At the end of the dinner she tried to send the leftover turkey home with me. I begged off, insisting she should keep and eat it because I'd never eat it all before it spoiled. She was happy and none-the-wiser. Me? I got a hamburger on my way home.

Nanie in 1982. Taken at JC Penney, this was during the time she worked there.

Nanie was a Knitter. Somewhere during the last year of her life she lamented to me that she could no longer knit booties because the needles she needed for them were too small for her arthritic hands. She was also a talented seamstress. She was redheaded, although it had faded greatly as she aged. She had only worked outside of the home for a short time in her life, when she worked at JC Penney. She spent the early part of her life in Illinois, only moving west to please her husband (Papa). She never really liked the rain and always missed the Midwest although I'm sure the Rockford she remembers is now a much changed city. She and Papa got a divorce in the 1970s when it was still an uncommon thing to do, but she saved cards and letters he had written her while they were married (she and Papa remained friendly until he passed in 1999).

I remained mute at Nanie's memorial service, because any words I would have liked to say would have been strangled by my tears. However, had I been able to say what I would have liked to, it would have read very similarly to this here. I am still angry that I got to spend such a short time with her but I am so thankful that it was as long as it was. I have mourned, finally, the passing of my own grandparents in my mourning for her. I know how much she loved me, and that I was never her grandson's girlfriend/wife, I was her granddaughter. My only regret was all the questions I never thought to ask about her life, the stories she could have told me if only prompted. She apparently started to write her life story at one point, that document is being kept safely by her daughter, to be held for posterity. I am thrilled that she was able to enjoy our wedding, that she was strong and well for it, and that her end was short and pain-free.

Nanie at our wedding in 2007.

Happy birthday Nanie, your passing has left a hole in my heart that no one will ever be able to fill, and I love you.

The cleaning and sorting of Nanie's things has been very difficult for me. This is the first time that I've ever been involved in this process and by the time we leave the house I always feel very deflated and wrung-out. Last week I got very angry at the whole situation and had a little bit of a meltdown but cooler heads always seem to prevail. As hard as the process is, there have been some very fun parts. Like this:

We're really not sure how long she'd been holding onto these bad boys, but they were fantastic. Giant, plastic framed, trifocals. She could not wait until they came back into style. Hopefully I won't be around to see the day that they do, as I'm sure we can all agree that this is not my best look.

We also made a new friend:

I'm not sure who this cat belongs to or if he even has a home [or really, if he is truly a he]. I think he's beautiful, he's friendly, he wants to spend time with us, and he has no front claws. That's right, someone declawed him and has left it to him to find a way to defend himself outside. I won't get into how I feel about declawing--suffice it to say that I'm not a fan--but I will be clear about how I feel about declawing outdoor cats. It is irresponsible, inappropriate and dangerous. This guy had a mostly healed cut on one ear as well as some small bumps under his fur but seemed to be physically okay otherwise. I will admit to wanting to pack him in the car and take him home with us. If I was 100% sure he was a stray I probably would. But since I'm not, we left him behind and just hope to see him when we're back at work next week.

I've been doing a fair amount of knitting, plus I have some great photos from Oregon Flock and Fiber but they'll have to wait until later. Here's to hoping it won't take me another month!

Just before 9am on August 21, 2007, my husband's beloved grandmother passed on. A heart attack on Monday morning caught us all by surprise as her health was very good. We are devastated, she was very very dear to all of us. I'm sure I'll have more to say about her later, when the hurt is a little less, she was an amazing, stubborn, crafty, wonderful person and the world is certainly better for having known her. I know I am.

Thank you for all of the kind words of support. They're greatly appreciated.

I may not have been an English major like both of my sisters, but I have held for many years a deep love of the works of Vonnegut. As such, I was greatly saddened to hear of his death, although we can all only hope to live such a long, full life as he had. And so, in tribute, from The Books of Bokonon from Cat's Cradle; the Bokononist last rites:

God made mud.
God got lonesome.
So God said to some of the mud, "Sit up!"
"See all I've made," said God, "the hills, the sea, the sky, the stars."
And I was some of the mud that got to sit up and look around.
Lucky me, lucky mud.
I, mud, sat up and saw what a nice job God had done.
Nice going, God.

photo source: Wikipedia entry for Kurt Vonnegut