Aunt Bea, Molly, and Bottle Tree

Aunt Bea, Molly, and Bottle Tree

Today while celebrating Fathers Day over at my dad's house, I got a new picture of the bottle tree, my dad's dog Molly and my (honorary) "Aunt Bea". She was a close friend of my dad's mother and a visitor from Carlsbad California, which is about 1/2 way between Dan Diego and Los Angeles.

Part II - Added at 8:00 PM

On Saturday morning, while in Chestertown Maryland, I got a call from my brother saying my step-grandmother had called him to tell him our grandfather was in the hospital. He apparently woke up early that morning at around 5:30, got out of bed and walked down the stairs without his glasses, opened the front door in his PJs and went looking for the newspaper. Apparently he couldn't find it, got twisted about, and the police picked him up since he was barefoot and in PJs around 8:00 AM several blocks away from home. The police figured out where he lived from odd bits and pieces since my grandfather apparently was very very confused - and took him home - where the front door was still wide open and my step-grandmother still asleep in bed upstairs. The policemen's voice apparently woke her up and she found them in her living room.

The police took my grandfather to the hospital "for observation" - and since then, they have ruled out "stroke", "seizure", and "aneurysm" but have not ruled anything "in" so to speak.

Grandfather was to be the guest of honor at my dad's house for father's day dinner - but he was still having tests down in the hospital today. As of now (8:00 OM Sunday) he is doing OK.

At the time of the phone call however, I was about 100 miles from home and in the complete opposite direction from the hospital which is in Quakertown, PA - so I came home early and in a hurry.

Now I had some things on my mind, and an ordinary white panel van would never merit much of a look, especially at 75 mile per hour on a four lane stretch of I-95 near Wilmington, Delaware - but its funny how you see things that you wouldn't see or give a second glance if someone hadn't mentioned them in the recent past.


The Gum Bum's Truck - Gum Clean

Aunt Bea was another one of my paternal Grandmother's friends - she grew up "around the corner from the church" they both attended. Later on, when my dad served his 2 weeks a year in the Army Reserves, my mom stayed with my dad's mom with my older brother (who was a one year old) and got to know Aunt Bea too - and the three of them became "best buddies" and they all went shopping together. Aunt Bea moved out west to California with her second husband (the first one died suddenly) and has lived out there for more than 40 years (the second husband died too, of cancer). When my parents had their 50th wedding anniversary she came back to the east coast to join the party and has become very active once more with our family.