2019 Life Logs, Day 255: Wonderful Dinner Honoring Granddad
Date: Thursday, September 12, 2019
Weather: Overcast with Rain in the AM; High 73, Low 54 degrees F
Location: At Home in the Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
I attended the first Newcomers meeting of the year this morning and signed up for way too many activities—a walking group, a hiking group, a biking group, a health-issues group, a tech-issues group, a gardening group, a book club, a wine explorers group, a women’s dining group, a singles group, and I think a few more. So, I should have no problem keeping busy this year! But the highlight of my day with dinner with Heather, Jed, Sam, Jonah, and Ollie. The first year after Mark’s death, in September of 2017, we had dinner at the Flying Bridge on Falmouth Harbor in honor of Granddad. Last year I was traveling and had dinner in Philadelphia with Kevin and Claire and Claire’s parents who were visiting from Canada. And this year I invited the Goldstones to have dinner at the Chart Room at Kingman Marina. It is a little north of here, but still on the Cape. Back in the 1990’s we kept our then sailboat, Skybreaker, at Kingman even though we lived in New Hampshire. And during graduate school, Heather lived aboard Skybreaker there for a year. The boys had never been there, so it seemed like a good choice for dinner.
Heather was in Boston today, so she was going to meet us there. I went a little early to pick up Jed and the boys, played basketball with Jonah, and then waited for the boys to get dressed. Jed just asked them to wear a collared shirt, but they all looked really spiffy.
I was honored to take such handsome young men to dinner. We all had wonderful meals and the boys enjoyed sitting at the piano bar and listening to the music. And I think the piano player enjoyed their attention. We had a fantastic waitress who asked each of the boys where they go to school. When Jonah said that he goes to Morse Pond, she asked him if he knew a particular teacher. Just so happens the teacher she asked about is his homeroom teacher and he is also the weekend bartender at the Chart Room. And his children work there as well. I think Jonah began to feel like a part of the Chart Room family. Sam was delighted that he could make requests at the piano bar and Ollie looked absolutely love struck watching the piano player. Jonah pointed out that we had to have dessert in Granddad’s honor as that was his favorite part of any meal, and Jonah’s as well. So we did. After dessert, the boys went out to take photos of the boats on the dock and in the anchorage. 
The moon was beautiful, just a little shy of full. It was chilly tonight, but otherwise, I don’t think it could have been a more perfect evening . . . certainly an evening Mark would have enjoyed.
