Matt and I visited Phran in her new digs on the edge of the Oswego-Scriba line June 2-4 – and can’t wait to return when we can stay longer! As you’d expect, the weather was perfectly lovely – same as our hostess! Besides the required ride out around the loop, including lunch al fresca at Rudy’s, we strolled along the raging river, then up Lake St., past the hallowed homestead, to Montcalm Park. Here’re a few snapshots: (click one to enlarge and slideshow)
Family
I grew up in the midst of 50 or so first cousins dristributed between the families of my mother (Conlin) and father. Two of my mother's seven sisters became nuns the others married men named: Conlin women married men named Bennett, Crawford, Heintz, McCabe, and Walsh; my father's two sisters married men named Hall and Barry!
Patricia’s first Leafs game
The way they’d been playing since the All-Star break had me tempted to suggest we go bowling instead of to the Barclays Center, but on the heels of the donneybrook in Boston two nights earlier, where they eked out a 6-5 win after squandering a 4-1 lead, I was eager for the tilt, with the apprehension that goes along with being a diehard Leafs fan, in check. (Photos by Patricia Pistono – click ’em)
We were in time for the pre-game warmups, right behind the Leafs bench – and en route to our seats in the upper deck, we decided the sit twenty five rows up, center ice, until told to move, and spent the entire game there – best seats ever! During warmups I pointed out who to keep an eye on, starting with Matthrews, Marner, and Nylander, of course.
So, we ended up with great sight lines for what is becoming an all-too-familiar pattern: second game in a row letting in opposition’s first shot; several passages of dominance, 4-2 lead slips away – Willie Nylander nets a hero go-ahead goal with 2 minutes remaining, Isles tie it 30 seconds later then win in OT. All in all, a typical game from this team, but we got to see goals by the top 3 hotshots, plus a short-handed tally by the rookie Zach Hyman, and a rare tally by the scrappy Nikita Shoshnikov. Oh yeah, it was Bobby Nystrom bobble head night too, so there were parting gifts!
Coming next? My first Leafs game – April 8, 1963, 3-1 over Detroit Red Wings to win the Stanley Cup at Maple Leaf Gardens!
Remembering Michael Crawford
If there is a teenage synonym for gentleman, it should be applied to my cousin Michael Crawford, the artist and New Yorker cartoonist who died aged 70 on July 12, 2016. We grew up near each other in Oswego, NY, with an age gap that made him a senior when I was a freshman in high school. I don’t know about you, but when I was a senior, freshmen were odd little things to be teased or dismissed outright. Mike was different, though.
My father died when I was a freshman, was waked at home, and Mike came to my rescue. In the midst of three days in a receiving line with my mother, sisters, uncles and aunts, Mike came up alongside me and said, “Want to get out of here?”
In a minute, we’d gone out the side door and up the street toward a soda shop, smoking Camels and talking about anything else at all. It was one of the best ninety minutes I ever spent – a light bit of companionship that made a heavy week easier to get through.
When his mother died, thirty years later, I reminded him of that and offered to return the favor. Instead of a wake, though, there was a gathering of family at Marge Crawford’s Covenant House apartment in New York – children, sisters, nieces, and nephews consoling one another, planning the funeral liturgy, and preparing a memorial program on the organization’s mimeograph machine.
Michael ducked out alone, unnoticed, and before long people were asking, “where’s Mike?” An hour or two later he was back and he asked me if I knew the lyrics to When the Saints Go Marching In. Why? Because he had gone down to the subway, looking for a musician to play at the funeral. He hired a trumpet player, who knew that number, and wanted to include the lyrics in the program.
The trumpeter was from Russia, not an English speaker, and Mike’s account of the negotiations was pretty funny. I wish I’d remembered it better, how he conveyed the time and the location and the overall requirements for the gig. The guy showed up the next morning, in the nick of time, and did a beautiful job leading the recessional parade through the corridors of Covenant House out to the hearse on 8th Ave. where he blew chorus after chorus while scores of mourners made their way onto the sidewalk.
Now, they’ve been reunited on a new and sunlit shore, and big Mike’s footsteps are with those who’ve gone before.
(Italics: “When the Saints Go Marching In” lyrics attributed to Louis Armstrong)
Dave Conlin Read; Lenox, MA July 21, 2016
Michael Crawford Memorial celebration
Family, friends, and colleagues of Michael Crawford gathered at the New York Institute of Medicine on September 17, 2016 in homage to a man whose genius with pen and brush matched his gift for relationships.
Rain delay prolongs Cubs World Series drought
Since it was an off-night in my fandom, I tuned in to game 7 between Chicago and Cleveland, and grew more and more irritated as the game continued way past bedtime, until I tuned out and went to bed at midnight when they called a giant time out with the score tied at six. Except for the Impossible Dream year of the Red Sox when I was at college in Boston, I’m not a baseball fan, but I’ve tried to become one at various times for various reasons, such as when I was dating a girl who was a big fan and because many of my literary heroes are. Compounding the drag of not seeing the last inning, after staying up late anyway, was the awful chore of finding out how it played out next morning because all the news stories went way overboard on all the ancillary business, without first stating the simple facts of how the Cubs broke the tie and how the Indians rally failed.
Bottom line: Rain delay also keeps baseball off my must-love list. A little rain shower – hold up the World Series, game 7, at midnight – c’mon boys. There may be no crying in baseball, but there sure is dumb.
California 2016
California trip for Devon’s wedding
