Dancing down Memory Avenue

So --  you’ve  discovered those old films or videos - - the ones you took at a party, or on vacation, or when your children were cuter than they are now.  You watched them once or twice, put them away in your junk drawer or closets, and then forgot all about them.


Having discovered them hidden in some dark storage box you do the right thing.  You have them converted to be played on a DVD.


Which is exactly what my brother Martyn and his wife Wendy did with their old videos (old being fifteen years ago!).  And they mailed copies of the DVDs to me.


I spent a hour or more yesterday afternoon dancing down Memory Avenue.

The DVD I watched yesterday (and I have another yet to view) was mostly of family scenes in 1997/98.

There was my nephew Sam, then just able to walk - now aged sixteen, grinning as he ran up a footpath.  That made me giggle.


There was my neice Laura, now aged twenty-three then aged eight.  


She was and is a fearless adventurer. Laura on horse-back  (with another neice – Beth), Laura up a tree, Laura zipping around like a pro in a go-cart, Laura being very solicitous of her little brother.


My lovely sister-in-law Wendy was to be seen, but hardly heard.  Her husband is like I -  a non-stop talker!


And that husband, my good brother was the mean bastard who zoomed past me when we were also go-carting down in Wales.


I especially enjoyed some footage of a family visit to my home in Pittsfield in 1997.  Martyn, Wendy, Laura and Sam visited, together with my oldest sister Maureen and our dear mother.


I saw video of Gwen Sears, Madge Buerger and Ginny Karis when they visited my home.  


There was a brief bit of our visit to the late Michael Thornburg with his wife Joyce and their gorgeous golden retriever “Chelsea”.


Some more of when Barbara Hanger visited with my family with her daughter Phoenix. 


After that visit Laura, with her usual spirit of adventure did an overnight with Phoenix.


Bill Hydon stopped by -  it was an unusually snowy day for April, but nothing could stop the fearless Laura riding pillion on Bill’s Honda motorbike. 


 Later that day the family went to visit with Bill and his wife Betty Dean -  and Laura sledded for the first time in her life.


Pittsfield parishioner Teddy  (Theodora) Carter invited us to her home in Worthington, MA – and Laura once again went horseback riding after she had receive full instructions as to grooming the horse  (good training there Teddy!).  There was a nice bit with Laura riding the horse, and Sam sitting in front of her.  It wasn’t clear if he was enjoying himself!


And I giggled at the bit where young Sam is in the back of the rental mini-van -  and fighting sleep even as he played with his Grandma’s walking stick.


I was NOT charmed with the appearances of jmp.  In  one I am telling a hoary old joke at the dinner table, and looking like the typical party bore. In other I am being almost pompous as I explain the mysteries of the internet to Ginny, Gwen and Madge.


(I was waxing eloquent because I had just purchased my first computer and therefore I knew everything about the web).  I used the name LYCOS  -  does anyone remember that?






And there was Mum in a big arm chair in my living room. She looked so sad.


Indeed she was sad -  her beloved second husband, our step-father Len had died suddenly the year before. 


The holiday was planned to help her live through her grief.  Instead the trip reminded Mum of just how sad she was, for the previous time she had been in my home her darling Len had been there with her.


But I am still glad to have a nice video reminder of Mum.