Photo of the week

Sunrise, sunset

Sunrise, sunset

Swiftly fly the years

One season following another

Laden with happiness and tears

I remember the morning I took this picture. It was a brisk morning in March. I wanted to get to the boardwalk before the sun came up. I think I got out of bed around 4:30 in the morning. M probably murmured something like: "What the hell are you doing?"

The ocean has always been at my side since I was a baby. I grew up with the smell of the sea air and tidal changes. I don't know if I could ever move too far away from it.

When we were kids and we used to drive up to my Grandmothers house for holidays. She lived up in Bloomfield, NJ. A BIG difference to the southern NJ that I'm used to. On the way home my siblings and I would more than likely fall asleep since it was about a 2 hour drive home but as soon as we got around Exit 40 on the Garden State Parkway we could smell the coal tar coated pilings and salty sea air and it would wake us up because we knew we were close to home.

.....

Normally I post black and white photos, but this one popped into my head today when I went to a service for a neighbor's wife who passed away recently. Actually the song popped in first and then the photo.

Heidi was her name.

I only met her a few times. Mostly I chatted with her husband Ray.

M and I called him the little Amish guy because he had that mustache-less beard of white hair like the Amish do.

He is a very spry 70 something year old man. Always outside doing something. I watched him and his son put a new roof on his house. I've watched him replace all of the windows on his house by himself and he scared me to death when he single handledly (sp?) took down a 50 ft+ pine tree in his back yard. It took him about 2 weeks to complete it, but day after day I watched him climb up that tree and rig some kind of line to the branch he was cutting and HAND saw it off and slowly lower it down to the ground.

When I told him he nearly gave me a heart attack as I watched him, he just chuckled and waved his hand and said he knew what he was doing.

There is/was a hedge that separates our two yards. When M and I first moved in the hedge was about 8 feet tall and had slowly but surely replaced the wood fence that the previous owners of our house had put up.

It was a beautiful hedge. I'm not sure what kind of plant it is but it stayed green all year round and was just very calming to look at. I tried to keep up with Ray in to make sure my side pruned and neat.

Then one day I came home and the entire hedge was gone.

Just GONE!

All that was left was the bits and pieces of the old fence that lay between our two yards.

First I was kind of pissed of. I have two dogs who will run away any chance they can. Well, one will run the other will just follow him around and look kind of stupefied.

I had to rig up some kind of chicken wire temporary fence just to keep my dogs from running away.

I spoke to Ray the following day and he told me the reason why he took it down. It was too hard for him to keep up with and his wife was ill so he needed to take care of her, not the hedge.

He also offered to help me replace the old fence that had deteriorated over the years.

One of my neighbors offered to drive me to Home Depot to pick up the fence panels I needed. The posts were still in good shape so they didn't need to be replaced.

Then one sunny spring day Ray and I were up early and put the fence up together.

He also offered me cuttings from the old hedge to replant.

I did - it's growing very nicely. I won't let it grow 8ft on my side because it's too hard to prune back but it looks healthy and green.

We chatted as we worked. He was a carpenter and taught shop at one of the high schools nearby. He lived in the neighborhood most of his life. First at one house in our development where he layed all of the brick in the front of the house by himself and the next in the house that he and Heidi resided in which was a little smaller and easier to take care of.

It was a very nice day and he is very easy to work beside.

Heidi very rarely came out. I always wondered why.

I met her the first time when I went to return a pair of snips that he used to trim the hedge that must have fallen on our side of the yard.

She was so sweet with bright sparkling dark eyes.

She didn't say much, but let me in and called for Ray.

One summer night I remember talking to Ray over the fence (it's 6 Ft high). Heidi came out and she is so tiny she couldn't see over it so he propped her up on some cinder blocks so she could say Hi!

As her illness progressed, we saw less and less of Ray outside. He only came out to mow the lawn or do some simple maintenance.

Every once in a while I saw him pull out an upholstered chair from the house and Heidi would come out and sit and watch him tend to her garden which I found out later was her pride and joy.

M and I used see them walking hand and hand around the neighborhood and he would take her down to the Metedeconk river and sit on a bench and just gaze outat the water.

Later we would see him pushing her around in a wheel chair wrapped up warmly in blanket.

I saw Ray only occasionally over the past year. He was a very devoted husband and kept Heidi home throughout her illness. She had Alzheimer's.

It is not an easy illness to witness.

There was a woman who came to help Ray out once in a while so that he could run errands and take care of things and I'm sure to just get a break once in a while. She used to walk Heidi in front of her house and I would say hello to them. I gave Heidi a little squeeze of the hand one time.

I don't even know if she knew where she was at that point.

This past Monday I was working out in the yard and Ray peeked over the hedge that has been re-planted (very Artie Johnson like) and let me know that Heidi had passed away.

He stayed strong when he told me and invited me to her service.

I asked him how he was holding up and let him know that M's Mom has the same disease and it's horrible. We were both so touched at how he cared for her.

Today at the service I shook his hand and you could tell the day had been tough on him. So many people offering their condolences. It can be comforting and emotionally exhausting at the same time.

I listened to the stories that each of their children shared about their mother. Her great cooking. Her homemade ginger bread houses and all of the fine detail she added. The endless tins of holiday cookies she would make. Her garden and how she passed the seeds of her plants down to her daughter who shares the same passion as her mother did in tending to each plant.

The moment that everyone was in tears was when her youngest son Christopher played a recorded message from his answering machine of his Mother and Father singing Happy Birthday to him. He's kept it all this time.

Damn I wish I had brought tissues.

I dedicate this post to the memory of Heidi Bruker and wish her family sympathy and peace.

Getting there

We got the tree up yesterday and we also managed to decorate it!

A few years ago we bought a fake tree. I prefer real trees, but the mess of the needles kind of drives me nuts. Months after Christmas is over I still find pine needles popping up in the carpet or working their way out of the furniture.

M is getting into the holiday spirit this year which is great and she wanted a live tree - so that's what we got! A few weekends ago we went on a spending spree and bought all new ornaments to replace some of the older balls that were starting to fade. We went with more the "decorator" look and bought ornaments that were in the same color scheme. The really remarkable part was that we both agreed on which ones we liked!

It looks very pretty, but there is a part of me that misses the ornaments that I've had for years. The ones the kids made for me when they were little. The two "baby's first Christmas" ornaments that are now well over 20 years old. My Mom even gave me some of the ornaments we used to hang on our tree when I was little. Unwrapping them each year is like opening a photo album - the memories just flood back.

I'll find places for them around the house somewhere. There's always a plant that needs a little holiday flair added to it!

Right now the house is a complete mess. I have about 6 tubs filled with holiday decorations that I have to find places for. They are all opened and sitting in my dining room with some of the contents pulled out and strewn about the floor. Some on the dining room table, coffee table, kitchen table - basically any available space. Today we'll put of the rest of the house decorations and try to clean up the place a bit.

Driving to get my coffee today one of my favorite Christmas songs came on the radio. Heirlooms by Amy Grant.

Here are some of the lyrics:

Up in the attic,
Down on my knees.
Lifetimes of boxes,
Timeless to me.
Letters and photographs,
Yellowed with years,
Some bringing laughter,
Some bringing tears.

Time never changes,
The memories, the faces
Of loved ones, who bring to me,
All that I come from,
And all that I live for,
And all that I'm going to be.
My precious family
Is more than an heirloom to me.

I think many people get very nostalgic around the holidays. You remember Christmases when you were a kid or when your own children were little and that wonder that came along with the season.

The commercialism of the holidays drives me insane. Seeing Christmas decorations up in the stores the day after Halloween is just maddening. Radio station that go all holiday music from Thanksgiving through New Years also drives me nuts. It's kind of killed the anticipation and the special feeling I used to get around the holidays.

Maybe I'm just old and crotchety now - that could very well be, but the holidays have lost a lot of meaning to me. And not just because of my lack of any religious convictions either. I am agnostic leaning more towards the atheist side of things but I had a time where religion did play an important part of my life. Now I'm just skeptical and grumpy.

I do like Christmas though and I still get mushy inside when I unwrap my manger set that my parents brought me from Ireland. I used to love to play with my parents manger set when I was a kid and looked at that little baby Jesus and wonder just who the heck was he and how did he go from a little baby to a man on the cross in just a few months?

Obviously I didn't realize that they skipped that whole middle part of his life in the bible. I still wonder what he was like when he was a kid though. Was he a bratty little 2 year old? A defiant 3 year old? What was he like as a teenager? Did he go out and drink with his buddies? Have wild camel races in the desert?

My mind obviously has some really odd thoughts going around in it!

Still - I think about it. I know I can't be the only one.

Well, back to the business of finishing up the decorating and then cleaning up the mess I've made.

I'll put my Christmas music on and my little Santa hat and let my mind wonder through all of the years of Christmas past: "Some bringing laughter, some bringing tears".

Peace all!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

(turn and face the strain)

Ch-ch-changes

****

Step back in time with me...to the younger years.

Lil' Shazza at different phases of her life.

The good, the bad...

the downright ugly!

Now mind you...most of these are school photos...and there were only like 2 people I've ever known in my entire life who actually liked their school photos.

I'm not one of them.

Still - it's kind of fun to see how I've changed throughout the years.

Warning! - I have never been one for my great send of fashion.

My Mom had had it...my daughter is a fashion plate, but me....not so much.

You'll get the idea soon!

Ok...here I am in kindergarten! Awwwww....glad to be plaid, cute little button nose...freckles!

This is first grade - missing a tooth...mauve is sooooooo not my color.

2nd grade and my first pair of glasses that I picked out all by myself!

I thought they were really cool at the time!

I am also sporting the female version of the "leisure suit". All polyester all the time!

Should have kept the bangs...I have a big forehead.

3rd or 4th Grade...not sure.

Ditched the glasses for picture day. Look how big the lapels are on this shirt!

Buttoned all the way to the top no less!

Oh uh...puberty got hold of me and turned me into a greasy stringy miserable mess. (This was the Beanbag Chronicle era...see what I mean?)

That kind of looks like a "Christmas Sweater" doesn't it?

Is it my imagination or did my forehead get bigger in this picture?

I look a kind of tired.

Probably just dreading picture day.

This was 7th or 8th grade - it's getting a little better.

All of a sudden...I've got boobs and I'm a red head. ???

Wait...is that a BIG ZIT ON MY CHIN!?

Geez...couldn't they have air brushed that out?

This is from my sophomore year in high school - back in plaid. I actually like this one.

That's not a zit on my cheek BTW...it's a mole.

Junior year in high school...damn my hair was long!

There is a hint of eye shadow on my eyes. I did go through a "make up" phase in my life form 1980 to about 1985.

Never learned how to turn down the shine on that forehead though...eeeks.

I'll have to see if I can find my senior high school picture somewhere.

BIG transformation, especially when you have Glamour Shots hired to do the photos!!!

The Beanbag Chronicles

Welcome to the Beanbag Chronicles:

These were the songs that eased a pimply faced, greasy feathered haired, desert shoe wearing, freckled and bespectacled, hormone raging pre-teenager sitting in my bean bag chair, with my big clunky head phones on, basking in the glow of my lava lamp and multiple candles dripping on old Chianti bottles that my parents threw away.

As with most 7th and 8th graders just when you start to become sexually aware of "things", Mother Nature plays a nasty trick on you and decides to turn you into the most revolting creature on earth!

I turned to music and clung to the tunes that I thought must have been written by people who could have read my mind and knew exactly what kind of torment I was going through.

This week the song I’ve chosen is: Operator, by Jim Croce. He was like the original "sensitive guy" wasn't he?

The guitar in Jim Croce’s songs was what made me go out and take lessons when I was in 6th grade.

Oh….to play like that!

But it wasn’t Jim playing…it was a guy named Maury Muehleisen.

Muehleisen was a classically trained pianist who took up the guitar at age 17. His own career as a singer/songwriter didn’t go far, but he later paired up with Jim Croce and became his lead guitarist.

Unfortunately, both Jim Croce and Maury Muehleisen were killed in the same plane crash on September 20th, 1973.

That was a very sad day.

I remember sitting in my friend Sue’s house playing his album over and over again…I think we nearly wore it out.

Here is an interesting tid-bit from Song Facts: In 2000, the Martin guitar company produced 73 guitars in honor of Jim Croce. In each of these guitars, an uncirculated 1973 dime was inserted in the third fret fingerboard in honor of this song and the final line, "You can keep the dime."

The Beanbag Chronicles

Driving home from work the other evening, I selected a playlist on my iPod that I must have created a while ago and have no recollection of creating it!

The songs were all female artists...most of them are kind of what you would consider sappy songs.

Slow...kind of mellow...

...then one song came back and I was immediately transported back to when I was in 7th grade. A pimply faced, greasy feathered haired, desert shoe wearing, freckled and bespectacled, hormone raging pre-teenager sitting in my bean bag chair, with my big clunky head phones on, basking in the glow of my lava lamp and multiple candles dripping on old Chianti bottles that my parents threw away.

Stacked on my record player were 3 or 4 albums of pre-teenage "I'll never fall in love" songs that will depress even the cheeriest.

Remember those days?

Your body is starting to mature, you're becoming sexually aware of "things" and at the same time Mother Nature plays a nasty trick on you and decides to turn you into the most revolting creature on earth!

And so...I was brilliantly inspired for my next series of heart wrenching, ear bleeding, nauseating songs.

But...at the time...when I thought I would never find my "special someone", they were what comforted me.

I've mentioned it before, but I was a total teenie bopper. My sister, who is 4 years older than me, was far cooler and into artists like Led Zepplin, Greg Allman, The Rolling Stone, the Beatles and more of the rock genre.

I was teased relentlessly for my taste in music as a kid, but hey...it made me happy at the time and my tastes have "matured and developed" since then!

This first song, and the inspiration for the series, was done Helen Reddy.

Don't worry it is NOT: "I Am Woman"!

This was one of her lesser known misses, but it was perfect for the adolescent little me who was hoping someday to fall in love.

When I was telling M about this song...she remembered it too and she was more from the cool rock genre kind of kids (more the Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath girl actually) , so I didn't feel all that bad about it.

The first line of the song sets the mood for sure, but it's the "oooohhhhaaaaaaahhhaaahhhh" that really gets me!





:::sigh:::

Those were the days!

Oh...and I have many, many, MANY more!

Tune in next week kids for another heart wrenching episode of "The Beanbag Chronicles"!

Mini Me

Dealing with a bout of insomnia this morning, I decided to make my awake time a bit productive!

I have stacks and stack of old photos sitting on my desk and in an old Rubbermaid container down here in my basement which is kind of "my office", but I have a small selection of photos that have always been my favorites. Most of them are friends and family...my kids at various phases in their lives and there are a few of me thrown in there.

Usually, I'm the one taking photos, not in them. I am a bit camera shy now that I have several chins, but I came across an old favorite photo of me.

The year was: 1967

I was 4

My babysitter had gotten a new Polaroid camera and was taking pictures of everything. This was back when you took the picture...then had to apply some kind of developing stuff to it then watched the image "magically appear" before your eyes.

You can imagine how mesmerized I was by this thing; and being the self absorbed 4 year old that I was...I happily posed for my picture to be taken by this magic modern gadget.

I present to you:


Lil'Shazza



Cute as a button wasn't I?

It is one of those childhood memories that always pops up in my head from time to time. I remember the house that we lived in. I remember my babysitters house too. I took M for a drive down there a couple of months ago - geez...the ol' hood has changed. There are parts of southern Jersey that are very rural, this is in the heart of what we call "The Pinelands". (Yes, I'm a Piney and proud of it). You don't want to wander off some of the main roads down there...it can get a bit scary!

We moved from that house when I was in kindergarten. I was devastated at the time. I didn't want to be separated from my best friend Sheri. I didn't want to go to a new school and have to make new friends.

I got over it pretty quickly though. The girl from across the street came over my house the day after we moved in and she became my new best friend.

Plus I was a bit of an explorer and there were all kinds of woods and swamps and new places and new "stuff" for me to investigate.

Fun times!

I may post a few more in the days/weeks ahead. I love pulling out the old photos from time to time. It seems a bit "old fashioned" to look at old photos now that everything is digital...even digital picture frames - but I promise I won't bore you too much!

Enjoy the weekend all!

Greetings from Asbury Park

If you are a Bruce Springsteen fan, you may recognize the title of this post.

Asbury Park is sort of a New Jersey icon. In it's hey day, it was a popular family resort, but fell in decline after rise of more popular shopping malls popped up and the race riots of the 1970's. My parents both remember visiting there as kids...it was THE happening place to go and it was closer to folks who lived in North Jersey than Atlantic City was.

The first time I had ever been to Asbury Park was for a Gay Pride festival about 15 years ago and my first impression was: Geez...what a dive! It looks like a bomb went off down here.

It definitely did not look like any of the mental pictures I had conjured up in my mind from the stories my parents told me.

It is trying very hard to make a come back. Right now, with the economy in the state it is in, if it can pull through this next year or two...it may just have a chance. Years and years of decline, combined with sky high crime rates and a large number of illegal immigrants who have taken a strong hold over the area will be very hard to overcome unfortunately.

Still, if you happen to drive though the town a lot of progress has been made and I am one of those people who really hopes it makes it.

I went out a few weeks ago and took a few pictures, but to see the old town in it's glory I recommend this site: Side O' Lamb

This is what remains of the old Casino building. This is right on the boardwalk and was the gateway between Asbury Park and Ocean Grove. (sorry the picture is a bit crooked) On the right site this casino used to extend out onto a pier. That fell into disrepair and had to be torn down unfortunately, but here is a postcard to give you an idea of what is used to look like:

Beautiful wasn't it?

I like to try and imagine what it must have looked like in it's full glory, but it's hard since I have only seen it in such bad shape. Still there are some old hints of what a grand building it must have been though.

Inside the Casino there used to be the most beautiful Carousel house. The carcass of the building is still there but the carousel is long gone. It's wood carved animals sold off to auction. At one point the building was used as a skate board park, but now the whole inside has been gutted. I'm not sure of what the future plans for the builing are, but here is a shot of the inside now:

This is Tillie. His grinning smile is almost synonymous with Asbury Park. He was painted on the outside of the Palace Amusement park. It was one of the first things you used to see as you drove towards the boardwalk. Unfortunately, that building was demolished as part of the restoration, but his likeness is in various places around town. Here he is on the outside of the Wonder Bar a popular hot spot in the summer time.

The Stone Pony is the place for rock and roll legends of the Jersey Shore! Many up and coming rock bands played here as they were starting up the ladder to success. Big names like: Bruce Springsteen (of course), Bon Jovi, South Side Johnny and the Asbury Jukes! There are still some well recognized names that come to play here during the summer time.

I just looked at their upcoming schedule and wow...Eddie Money will be playing there on April 4th. Eeks...looks like the place is going down hill!

Interestingly enough, one the other side of Asbury Park is "God's Square Mile", a little town called Ocean Grove. Asbury Park was the town to go to play, and drink and whoop it up! Ocean Grove is the complete opposite!

Originally established as a religious camp meeting, Ocean Grove today is a very popular spot along this section of the Jersey shore. It's filled with picturesque Victorian homes, a small but thriving little down town area filled with quaint stores and coffee shops. It even has an old fashioned Apothecary Cafe were you can sit up on the stools and order an old fashioned ice ream float!

At the center of the town is the Great Auditorium:
Sunday services are still held there all summer long and also some really great concerts. I believe it holds up to 6,000 seats and there are times during the summer when this place is packed to the brim!

It is closed for the season, but I stole this picture off Wikipedia which gives you an idea what it looks like inside...it's just a gorgeous wooden structure with a beautiful pipe organ all along the back wall.

Surrounding the Great Auditorium are the tents! They actually call it Tent City! There are just over 100 tents and they are handed down from family to family. Very few are offered up for sale. They have a permanent wooden foundation and then in the late spring you can see the families coming back into town to put up the canvas top that will become their shelter for the summer time.

During this time of year...all you can see if the wooden base looking a bit abandoned and kind of lonely:

But in the summer time, they are really beautiful! They are landscaped and decorated. People move antique furniture in and have had plumbing and small kitchens installed. They are still used as a summer retreat!
Ocean Grove was one of several towns in New Jersey that what was known as "Blue Laws". These were designed to give you a day of worship and rest on Sunday - the Lords Day. All of the stores would close down for the day. Ocean Grove actually took this little law a step further and did not allow motor cars within the town on Sundays. People would actually have to drive their car and park it in a large lot across the street and then the gates of the town were closed at midnight on Saturday and not opened again on until midnight on Sunday.

Most town with Blue Laws have been overturned or people just really do not pay attention to them anymore. In Ocean Grove, you are not able to purchase alcohol within the town limits, but there are plenty of liquor stores and bars in the neighboring towns to take care of that! You are also not allowed to use the beach on Sunday until after service. They close off the entrances and take it very seriously!

Here is a picture of the Beersheba Well that stands just next to the Great Auditorium:

If you click on the image, you can see written up on the ceiling: "We have found water" Beersheba and then off to the other side it has Gen. XXVI, 32, 33. (you can all look that one up yourselves)

M and I lived in Ocean Grove for about 1 year. Actually I was a swinging bachelorette for about 2 months while I put her through hell trying to decide did I want her to move in or not? Yes one week...no the next. Poor woman! Finally, she did obviously.

We lived on the third floor of the Kitch and Kaboodle. The smallest apartment in the world, but a lot of love inside! (sorry for the crooked picture again...I must not have had my V8 that morning.)

During that period of time, Ocean Grove was struggling a bit. Many of the older hotels were abandoned and in disrepair, there were a lot of Section 8 housing areas which were set up for low income families. There were also a lot of crazy people living there. Not scary crazy..more like Tuorette syndrome crazy, some folks with other mental handicaps too. They settled in when many of the "state homes" in the area closed down and because it was cheap for them to live. The town is pretty much a self contained with it's own little grocery store and hardware store so you didn't have to drive a car to live there. And, since it's only literally one square mile, if you did have to walk...you didn't have to walk far.

Ocean Grove has gone through a major revitalization and I just read that the property values have gone way up. You can thank the Gay's and Lesbians for that one folks! They lived there and bought up houses (you can't own the land in Ocean Grove, it's owned by the Camp Meeting Association), they cleaned the area up and opened up the once vacant stores. Once things started looking good again, well, then the yuppies started moving in.

Ocean Grove also got it's knickers in a twist a few years ago when a same sex couple applied to hold their Civil Union ceremony up on a pavilion on the boarwalk. The Camp Meeting Association denied them for religious reasons and the town found itself in the middle of a lawsuit. Kind of ironic that at one time the GLBT community and the Camp Meeting Association used to work side by side to turn the town around and make it a popular resort. Now that it is...it's turning its back on some of the citizens who did a lot of hard work to get them there.

Still, it's is one of my most favorite places in NJ and I'll try to get more pictures once the weather gets nicer and the tents are up and the Great Auditorium opens it's doors again for the summer.

And if you are into flea markets...they have THE best! They are held 2 times a year in the lawn in front of the Great Auditorium - but you gotta get there early before all the good stuff goes!

This post is for me ol' mucker Dive from the Small Glass Planet who has taken us around his world, so here is a small slice of mine!

Mom

Happy Birthday Mom - I miss you.

I love you.

Rest in peace.