Plans Change and We Adjust

January, in its final days, began behaving normally. We awoke Monday morning to three inches of snow. It was the sort of snow that sticks to everything and transforms the most mundane objects into beautiful art. Every branch on every tree, every stem of every dead weed, the rocks, the mailbox – all of it made lovely by the snow. I had a dentist appointment in town that morning and the drive there and back was gorgeous.

On my way to the dentist.

It snowed again on Wednesday, a more substantial storm with gusty winds that blanketed us in another three inches. Stacey and Hannah decided to stay home from work that day and not venture out in the snow. That snow also changed other bigger plans for us. Stacey, Miriam, and Hannah were going to drive down to the Thayn’s house on Wednesday night. Stacey was supposed to fly out of Pittsburgh Thursday morning to go to Utah for the weekend. Miriam and Hannah were going down to spend the weekend at the Thayn’s. No one went anywhere on Wednesday. Stacey will not drive or even ride in a car when there is snow on the road. So she cancelled her plans. The roads were good by Friday, so Miriam and Hannah drove down that afternoon. Hannah will be home later today. Miriam is traveling on to spend some time at the Foster’s house. So our plans for the weekend changed, but we adapted and it all turned out in the end. I would have been home alone all weekend, so maybe I don't mind the snow so much.

My opera choice last week, after two tragic tales by Puccini, La Bohème and Tosca, was a comic opera, opera buffa in Italian, by Gioachino Rossini (1792 – 1868). The Barber of Seville (Il barbiere di Siviglia) is an opera in Italian, based on a French play, about a Spanish barber. How’s that for a convoluted story? It is the most famous of Rossini’s thirty-nine operas. The story comes from a comic trilogy by French playwright Pierre Beaumarchais – The Barber of Seville, The Marriage of Figaro, and The Guilty Mother. Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro, composed 30 years earlier in 1786, is based on the second part of the Beaumarchais trilogy. The premiere of Rossini’s opera at the Teatro Argentina in Rome on 20 February 1816, was a disaster. The audience was upset that Rossini had written the opera when there already was a popular opera written by Giovanni Paisiello. To show their displeasure, the fans of Paisiello hissed and jeered throughout the performance and finally stormed the stage. However, the second performance was successful and Rossini’s Barber has remained popular ever since. It is number six on the list of the most performed operas today. You’d recognize some of the music. Parts of it have been used in many cartoons. The most famous is the 1950 Looney Tunes cartoon with Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd. Woody Woodpecker (1944), Willie the Whale (Disney 1946), Michigan J. Frog (Merrie Melodies, 1955), and Tom (of Tom and Jerry fame, 1964) have all taken a shot at singing Figaro’s aria “Largo al factotum.” 

Famous performances of Figaro's aria.

The story of the opera centers around the character of Figaro, the barber of Saville. Here is a blurb:

“Figaro! Figaro! Fiiigarooo!” Indeed, demand is at an all-time high for the sharp-scissored and equally sharp-witted barber of Seville. Chief among the clamoring masses is Count Almaviva, who begs his friend to help him woo the beautiful young Rosina. The catch? A bumbling, older doctor has claimed her first! Pulling from a bottomless bag of tricks and disguises, this scheming duo stops at nothing – breaking and entering, shaving distractions, even good old-fashioned bribery--to turn the tables in the name of true love.”

I listened to two different performances last week and I will confess that I prefer Puccini’s more straight-forward musical style over Rossini’s florid and ornate style, but the story of Figaro is very entertaining.

On Friday evening, with Miriam and Hannah gone, Stacey and I did something a bit out of the ordinary. We seldom eat out. We sometimes stop at Chic-fil-A when we’re in Buffalo, or Erie, or Pittsburgh (they are the closest Chic-fil-A’s to us), which isn’t very often, and that’s about it. But our local fire hall began holding its Friday Fish Fries on Friday and we decided to have dinner there. Fire hall Friday fish fries are a tradition here starting in late January and running, usually, to Easter. For a few dollars we had a bowl of clam chowder, fish, French fries, coleslaw, and a dessert, and we got to mingle with people in the community, which we don’t do often enough. It was all good and we like to support our volunteer fire department. After dinner, we drove into Coudersport and went to the movies. The movie was A Man Called Otto. It wasn’t on my list of movies that I want to see, but Stacey wanted to see it, so we went. It turned out to be better than I expected. Dinner and a movie – I guess we had a date night. We should do that more often.

At the fire hall.

Friday Fish Fry.

At the movies.

Meanwhile, down at the Thayn’s house, it was Doll Party time! As part of June's eighth birthday celebration, they had a Doll Party. They invited friends to come. Everyone brought a doll. They made blankets and pillows for their dolls. They played games and had cake and ice cream. Miriam and Hannah were there to help with all that. It sounds like they had a great time.

At the Doll Party.

Florence and her doll.

And out in Utah, Geoffrey and Joni took their oldest, Ellie, to the temple for the first time. That was why Stacey was flying out, she was going to go with them. We talked to them later in the day and they reported that they had a great experience. We are so proud of Ellie.

Geoffrey, Joni, and Ellie at the temple.

Yesterday was my grandfather’s birthday. Lawrence Evered Howe, we call him Papa, was born 129 years ago in 1894 in Genesee, just nine miles from here. I don’t know where exactly he was born, if it was right in town or in an outlying area. I don’t know if the house he was born in is still standing. I do know that when he was young his father, Theodorus Howe, bought a hundred acres of land and built a house and a barn half way between Genesee and Gold in a place called Keech.

My grandfather at 8 months.

Papa with his sister Sarah.

I know where Keech was even though it is no longer marked on maps. At one time there were several farms there and a schoolhouse that was also the post office. The old schoolhouse is still there. It was made into a house and someone lives in it. The Howe farm is gone. The house burned long ago. The barn was the last thing left standing and was there until almost 2000. On every visit we made to Potter County when I was young, my great aunts made sure to point that barn out to me and tell me “This is Keech.” Not many people today know where Keech was or that it even existed. My grandfather loved Keech. I’ve heard the stories of his happy childhood there. But not from him. Or if I did, I don’t remember.

The Howe farm at Keech.

The Genesee High School basketball team. Papa is in front on the right.

Papa in World War I.

My grandfather died in 1960 at the age of 66 when I was just two years old. There are no photographs of Papa and me together. I wish there was. I have a letter he wrote the day I was born. He and my grandmother were vacationing in Florida at the time. He wrote: “I dreamed about you folks last night so we are expecting news of the blessed event. Hope and pray that everything is right.” I was the blessed event. I have no real memory of him, but there is a feeling that wells up in my mind when I try to remember him. I think the feeling is love. I know that he loved me. I’ve heard stories all my life from my parents about how much Papa loved me. Those stories and that feeling of love have shaped my life in many ways.

My grandparents, Nana and Papa, were both chiropractors and although they both grew up in and loved Potter County, during the Great Depression they struggled to keep their practice here going. They lived here in Gold for a while, in this very house, and had an office here – in this room where I am sitting right now. They also lived for a time in Galeton (where my father was born) and in Westfield over in Tioga County. They also had offices in both those places. In the 1930's they moved downstate to New Cumberland, just across the river from Harrisburg. That’s where they raised their family – my father and his two sisters, my aunts Joyce and Sally. Eventually they settled at 431 Bridge Street in a big old house. My grandparents’ chiropractic office was on the first floor. They lived on the second floor. When my father grew up, he became a chiropractor too, and when his parents retired, he took over their practice and moved into that house where he raised his family, my family, for a while. That’s where I lived for the first ten years of my life.

Papa at Chiropractic college. He's on the left with the skull.

My grandfather was raised on a farm and he remained a farm boy all his life. Everywhere he lived he planted a garden. I grew up in the ruins of his garden at 431 Bridge Street. His love of gardens and farm life were passed on to me. Everywhere I’ve lived, in Ohio, in Illinois, in California, I too have planted gardens. Now I live in a place where he once lived and I have gardens where he once planted gardens. It is in my gardens that I have always felt closest to him. I felt it as a child in New Cumberland as I watched the flowers that he planted come up each spring. I feel it here as I tend my flower beds, vegetable gardens, and orchard. One of the nicest compliments I ever received was from Papa’s sister, my Great Aunt Eleanor. After we moved here, we would often visit her in the retirement home where she lived. In the summer I’d take her vegetables from my garden. One time as we sat and talked of family and gardens she said to me, “You remind me so much of Lawrence. You’re like him in so many ways.” It makes me happy to think of it.

Papa with his sunflowers.

 My grandfather, Lawrence Evered Howe.

Today was the fifth Sunday of the month, so I was in charge of the second hour meeting at church. I did a presentation on learning gospel principles by singing from the Children’s Songbook. I realized a while back that many of the members in our branch joined the church as adults and never went to Primary. Most of them are not very familiar with the Children’s Songbook. Having grown up in the church and attended Junior Sunday School and Primary and then having seven children who all went to Primary and a wife who was, in my unbiased opinion, the best Primary chorister ever, I know and love those songs. They teach basic doctrinal concepts with easy to understand words and memorable melodies. I gave a brief history of the songbooks over the years. I told them how to access the hymns and songs on the Gospel Library app, and then we learned and sang I Am a Child of God, I Lived In Heaven, I Pray in Faith, Jesus Once Was a Little Child, and a few other songs. I think it went well.

The Children Sing (1951-1969), Sing With Me (1969-1989), Children's Songbook (1989- present).

We are home from church now. On the way home we saw two Bald Eagles, one over on Piangetelli Hill feeding on a dead deer. The second was right here in Gold near the old Grange Hall sitting in a pine tree. I tried to get some photos, but none of them turned out. We love seeing them. So it's just Stacey and me here until Hannah gets home later. We're having leftovers for lunch. It's very quiet. It has warmed up enough (37°) that it is raining, which has turned all the snow to slush. I'll be heading down to do the chores soon. And then we'll spend a quiet Sabbath afternoon, just the two of us.