Friends

Not the T.V. show type, who seemed to live their “friendship” by sarcastic put downs and faux humour.

Nor the Face Book or My Space “friends” who do not have to sweat with us, argue with us, touch us, or have belly laughs with us.

No, the friends who laugh, weep, argue or agree with us. The friends to whom we can “pour it all out, chaff and grain together - keep what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away”.

Such are the Haulers for me.

I met them in 1976 in Fitchburg, MA. There I officiated (ten or so weeks into my ordained ministry) at Arthur Hauler’s funeral. He had grown up in Fitchburg, and long since moved away. I had never met him.

His widow Dorothy was at the funeral, together with his three sons and their families.

I was especially drawn to son Donald and his wife Barbara. And thus began a now 31 year friendship.

Captain Dr. Donald R Hauler MC, USN was stationed in D.C. at the Pentagon. The family lived in McLean VA. Barbara Hauler worked at home. They had three children, Mark, Wendy and Gary.

I visited them in McLean, so did my Mum on one of her sojourns in the States. Don and Barbara visited my folks in England.


Mark went away to College and eventually married Marci. They have two daughters, Lindsey and Lesley, and I was present for Lindsey’s Bat Mitzvah.

Wendy, (now Cdr. Wendy Pinkham, USN) also went to college, did her Masters at B.U. and married Charles Pinkham. I shared with their Rector in the marriage ceremony. They now have three sons, Chip, Chris and Nick. Wendy is stationed in Beaufort, S.C.

Gary, after College met his life partner Ed. They have been together for 20 years.

And this was the gang that gathered together for Christmas 2007 in Pensacola, FL where Barbara and Don have retired.

Don, Barbara, Mark, Marcia, Lindsey, Lesley, Charles, Wendy, Chip, Chris and Nick, Gary and Ed. And me.

We ate well, but not too much. We got to be silly. We enjoyed the children. We exchanged gifts.

Gary and Ed made wonderful pirogues. Marcia cooked up a splendid mashed butternut squash. That all went down with the most moist and tender turkey on Christmas Eve.

Ed, Gary and I took a walk on a cold and windy beach. Afterwards, seeking good hot soup, we found ourselves in Foley, Alabama at Lambert’s Restaurant. No soup here, but there were “throwed rolls”. We decided that we’d had an ethnic experience.

See http://www.throwedrolls.com/fun_facts.html

Don, Barbara and I went to Church on Dec 23rd at their parish, The Church of the Advent in Lillian, Alabama. This is a small country Episcopal Church, and I (having been there in 2006) pinch hit in the Choir.

Most of the family returned there on Christmas Eve and I again joined the choir. Eight voices. A tenor and a soprano also play the recorder and the violin. A non singer is a good recorder player. The other bass also plays the recorder and guitar, and sang tenor, trusting my booming baritone. It reminded me of the Quire in a Thomas Hardy novel.

Rector Martha Kreamer preached a damn good and intelligent sermon. She thanked me for being the “Amen corner”.


We opened some gifts on Christmas Eve (after service) and others on Christmas Day, early enough for Gary and Ed to take their flights to D.C., and for my flight to Sarasota.

I got back on Christmas Day just in time to have dinner at a Sarasota Japanese Restaurant, with my friends Ben and Catherine, with Claudette and Trish down from Stephentown, N.Y.

I’ve known Claudette for not a few years (Stephentown is near Pittsfield, MA), and I was meeting Trish for the first time.

Real friends indeed. Nothing faux here!

Comments

  1. How lovely! Sounds like you had a wonderful Christmas. If you're ever up this-a-way, we can always use a pinch hitter in our choir, too! We've got two sopranos, two to three altos depending on the week, one tenor, and one bass -- tiny, but we have lots of fun! Of course, we're at the UMC right now, but they have almost nearly as nice music as the Piskies.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shoe insults

The background, the couple, my friends, the wedding ceremony, the Shaykh, the Priest,

It began in Bristol U.K. "A man dies" and "Jesus Christ Superstar"