Memory Lane

When I was young - sixth grade at the latest - I wrote a letter to a Bonnie A. from Port Coquitlam, British Columbia. I think I got her name and address from the back of a comic book where it said “pen pals wanted”, or something like that.

Anyway, I sent the letter off and she wrote me back. We wrote each other for years and even exchanged pictures (which I still have, believe it or not!) and cassette tapes, so we heard each other talking.

At the time, Bonnie had several pen pals but she was the only one I had. But something she introduced me to was “slam books”. Slam books were cut up sheets of paper that are stapled together to make a book. The person who made it decorated it up any old way they wanted to and each page had a theme. They might look something like this:

Page 1
Your Name
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Page 2
Your Address
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Page 3
Favorite Singer
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

You would go to each page and fill out your answer. If you were #1 on page one, you were #1 on page two, and so on.

The last page always said something like “when this book is complete, please return to:” and it would have the name and address of the person who made the booklet. There was almost always a page that asked if you were interested in new pen pals. If one said “yes”, anyone could start writing them.

Over time I started writing people from the books and at one point I had a pen pal from almost every single state in the United States. I got a lot of mail, every day. It eventually got to be too much and I cut back the number of pen pals I had.

First to go where the superficial “how are you? Write me back. letters. (That would literally be the extent of their correspondence.)

I ended up with five that were special to me (unfortunately I’m drawing a blank on two of their names and I hate that!). There was Bonnie, Kathy R from California, Aviva C from New York, someone from Minnesota (Sharon, I think but I’m not sure) and someone from Oklahoma.

Bonnie and I stopped writing each other when we were in high school. She wrote me a letter saying she had to stop writing. I never really understood why but I respected that and I still remember her fondly today.

The girl from Oklahoma, that ending was weird. She was a huge Elvis fan and after he died I only received one letter from her. She was telling me how much she had loved him and how upset she was that he’d died and the letter ended mid-sentence. I never heard from her again, despite sending her several letters asking if she was okay.

I’m not sure when Aviva and I stopped writing. I think we had graduated high school though. Same goes for the girl from Minnesota (although I wrote Aviva even longer than her).

Kathy though, we corresponded up until I got married at 21. I was willing to continue writing but I think she felt she was more of an intrusion - like it changed things. The first couple of years after I married I got a birthday and Christmas card but that was it. I think we lost touch because my ex and I moved around a lot those first few years. I always hated that - losing touch that is.

You’re probably wondering what the point of this long post is. Well, yesterday I had lunch with two co-workers and one of them asked me if I went to high school with someone and I didn’t know. So I pulled out my junior year yearbook last night to see if I could find this girl. (I didn’t.) While going through it, a letter I’d started to Kathy fell out and it brought back some great memories of the friendship we had - despite never having met face to face.

So, I guess the point (if there really is one) is that people you haven’t communicated with in decades, people you haven’t ever met face to face, can impact your life and still bring a smile to your face some 20+ years later, at just the memory of them.

By special request :o)

If I’ve seemed scarce lately it’s because I’m having computer issues. Internet issues to be more specific because it hasn’t impacted any other aspect of my computer life but the issues are only on my home computer so I don’t really know what that says. I have some ideas about how I might fix things but the concern is that I’ll lose internet access altogether, so I’ve kinda been putting that off for now. :o)

Anyway, Ellen asked for a new blog post, so here it is...

I’ve really been enjoying Dancing with the Stars. All of the celebrities have really been coming along wonderfully. But to answer Ellen’s question - Jerry went home last night. I really hated to see him go (huge difference from my initial, they haven’t danced yet, opinion isn’t it? ;o) ) but in fairness, he did have the least natural talent of the remaining celebrities. Worst part for me (and maybe him, I don’t know) was that he gave the best performance he has to date this week. All the couples are having to learn two new dances every week now and this was the first week of that. I really thought we’d see some “off” dancing but everyone really stepped it up in a big way. It’s just been really great to watch the progress of the celebrities.

The final four dancers are Monique, Joey, Emmitt and Mario. Mario keeps being compared to the professional dancers and is consistently coming in first place with the judges so I think he has a good chance of winning the whole thing, although Emmitt and Joey have been strong competitors. I think it will be the fan base that determines the winner and if I had to guess, I would say that Emmitt has the biggest fan base.

But what do I know? ;o)

Don't forget the list!

You can make a list. You can check it twice. But if you forget to take it with you to the store.....you might forget something you need.

Which is kind of what happened to me this morning. We're celebrating Boss's Day tomorrow at work and all the staff support are making something for it.

I'm bringing Shrimp Pasta Salad. I pulled out the recipe and made a list of all the ingredients. Then I went into my kitchen to see what I was out of and what I had and checked off the items I needed (basically I had the salt and the chili sauce - which I only ever use for this recipe but not much is needed so I still have some - and needed everything else).

You add to that that we have a cake in the freezer from the retirement reception (see previous post) and needed it to thaw by 10:30 tomorrow morning. We considered taking it out Friday afternoon but our cleaning crew is supposed to clean out our refrigerators every Friday and they will if it's filled with items they can take home to their families, otherwise they leave it alone. And we didn't want them to take our cake. So I decided to go in before I went to the grocery store this morning and take the cake out of the freezer.

It wasn't until after I left work and was headed for the grocery store that I realized I'd forgotten my list! It was pouring down rain and I decided to wing it and hope I remembered everything I needed, instead of going by my house and getting the list.

So there I was, going down every aisle, looking at everything they had, hoping all the ingredients would come back to me. I spent more time in the grocery store than I think I ever have in my life!

I checked out, confident that I (hopefully) remembered everything and as I was loading the bags into my trunk I remembered the last time I made this recipe. I'd made it for my Bunco group and one person wouldn't touch it because it had white ingredients in it. Seriously, she won't eat anything white - even if it's just an ingredient in a dish.

Anyway, I'm glad I remembered that story because I'd forgotten the mayonnaise! I closed my trunk and went right back into the store and bought a jar of mayonnaise, hoping THAT was the only ingredient I had forgotten on the first round and came home.

I REMEMBERED EVERYTHING! Yay!

Now I just have to wait for the shrimp to thaw (in the refrigerator) and I'm good to go. :o)

What a relief!

Who has more fun?

I thought I’d post a few pictures from the reception we had for a man who retired last week (he comes back next week as a consultant - not a long retirement). The theme of reception was “mobster”. Tom (the retiree) is Italian and he makes reference to that daily. Everyone (or most everyone) received hats when they walked in the door - “mobster” hats - and most wore them for the duration of the reception. And those of us "in the know" wore black for the occasion. :o)

Anyway, we had a visit from "Guido". Guido gave a history of Tom’s career with the company. He spoke like the godfather. He was great, never once breaking character, despite the fact that everyone in the audience was rolling over laughing.


Guido introduced "Cousin Vinny". Like Guido, Vinny stayed in character the entire time, despite everyone laughing their rears off. He gave a presentation using materials Tom used in his day to day job. You see, Tom was our team’s safety specialist. We have a million acronyms and Vinny used the numbers but just “tweaked” the meanings of the acronyms. For example, we have to do these safety observations every month, called BBSOs (Behavior Based Safety Observations). Vinny used BBSO as Big Bosses Secretly Offed. GIMT (I can’t remember what stands for in our world...it’s not one I use) stood for Guys In My Trunk. Things like that. It was hilarious! Oh yeah, and Vinny, in real life, is a skinny guy but he was “beefed” up with bubble wrap for effect. It was so much fun.

We had a nice spread of food. I sampled everything except what is dead center on the table. Can you see what it is? It’s fruit! That’s right, I sampled all the sweets and unhealthy stuff but passed on fruit, ‘cause that’s the kind of girl I am (see Pam’s Naughty Chair if you want specifics).

This last picture is of my friend who wanted her picture taken with me (I’m on the right for those that don’t know). Normally I don’t like pictures taken of me but you know, I kinda like this one. :o)