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At one point in time, I had three file cabinets and a total of ten file drawers. All were jammed with folders. As we prepared to down-size…and move across the country, I made it my mission to “get rid” of all that “clutter.” The file cabinets were dispersed. The antique walnut one that Mr. Penfire…
My Uncle Joe joined the US Navy for a six-year hitch in August of 1940. He served on USS Wichita, a heavy cruiser, USS Redwood, a ship that installed and serviced anti-torpedo nets, before applying to become a lighter-than-air sailor. He was accepted into the program and assigned to Blimp Hedron #1, Lakehurst (NJ) Air…
A week ago Sunday, April 26th, the Los Angeles Times ran an editorial entitled “The brutality of coronavirus triage.” This piece acknowledges a terrible reality—the incomprehensible dilemma that doctors face when emergency rooms are overwhelmed with more desperately sick people than they can possibly help. “The most harrowing instances have been in the northern Italian…
“Christos Anesti.” “Christ is Risen.” It is Easter Sunday. But today is like no other Easter Sunday I have experienced. No Easter eggs. No church…overflowing with people dressed in crisp new outfits, bright spring colors. No abundant cascades of fragrant flowers. No Easter lilies. Pots of bright tulips. No choirs singing. No hymns. No Holy…
My mother died on Good Friday. She was just one month shy of her 90th birthday. The year was 2003, and Good Friday fell on April 18th that year, but no matter. Every year since, on Good Friday, I think of her. And I think of my Uncle Joe, her brother, two years younger, who…
It snuck up on us, didn’t it? This Covid 19 virus! For Mr. Penfire and me, the preoccupation since about Christmas was up the street…at our daughter’s house, where our son-in-law was undergoing medical tests…and, ultimately, some very serious surgery at the end of February…and there were four young children who needed to be driven…
Why did I think this play was going to be funny? It’s not. Distressing would be more like it. But I’m not complaining. Sometimes it’s better to have painful truths sneak up on you. For if you knew they were going to confront you head on, you might decide to make take strategic turn before…
November 11, 2019. One hundred and one years since the Armistice that made 11 a.m. of the eleventh day of the eleventh month a moment for reflection and remembrance. Inevitably on this day, the veterans who come first to my mind are my mother’s three brothers, who served overseas during World War II. (A fourth…
Why travel? Why spend a week or two or three plus your hard-earned dollars —to see, well, whatever you choose to see? Last year Mr. Penfire and I spent three weeks in Italy. Those weeks were filled with new experiences, excursions we had planned and unexpected surprises—a few wrong turns, a couple of mishaps, and…
Writing “The Battalion Artist” – What was Nat Thinking?
On June 21, 2012, Nat Bellantoni, age 91, told his daughter Nancy he wanted to write a book. “Well, you better hurry up!” Nancy said. Even now, even as he neared death, it was possible to joke with Nat. But he was serious. “I want a book about my paintings.” The eyes of father and…