Reminiscences on the Beach

Standing on the beach watching the tide roll in often makes me think of my family. Both the dead and the living. To me they are all very much alive. I have said it before and will repeat it...my parents did great things, but often in a cockeyed way. My father, for instance, loved his outdoor barbecue. Even in Ohio in midwinter, we still had grilled chicken, burgers, and steaks. Not everyone was so lucky to get chargrilled meats year round. I can still see Dad in the backyard during a monumental snow squall, running the electric snowblower to forge a path from the glass patio doors to the grill. Then he would stand at the grill as the wind howled and the blizzard raged. He had an umbrella in one hand held high to shield him from the elements. He had a spatula in the other hand, turning the chicken.

My mother liked to cook too. Inside. In the dark. She was saving electricity. But sometimes I would grope my way into the kitchen and stumble over my mother in the pitch blackness as she muttered, "That chicken cacciatore is nearly done."