The Giving of Thanks

A little bit late on the Thanksgiving musings this year.  I hope it was grand for all of you.  We spent the day at Jean's (thank you Jean for a wonderful feast!) but Amy couldn't come home and we missed her company.  The weather was glorious in this neck of the woods, for which I am very grateful.

Which brings me to the general point of this post.  I'd been thinking a great deal about Giving Thanks.  I came across this article in a recent NY Times (perhaps you read it yourself already): A Serving of Gratitude May Save the Day. Who couldn't continue to read an article that states "A new study shows that feeling grateful makes people less likely to turn aggressive when provoked, which helps explain why so many borthers-in-law survive Thanksgiving without serious injury." (this doesn't apply to anyone I know personally of course). 

But I don't want to be passive about giving thanks.  I feel like it should be more than sharing prayers around the dinner table.  Demonstrating gratitude usually requires deeper consideration of those things for which I am thankful.  So when I consciously choose to park further away from the store entrance so that closer parking spots can be available to those who need them more than I do, I feel like it demonstrates my gratitude for being physically comfortable walking a few extra feet.  When I clean snow off cars in the parking lot after work, I hope this pays itself forward as many times as necessary to get a returned favor out there to someone who really needs it.  Since Facebook says it's not six degrees of separation, it's only 4.74 degrees--paying it forward should take significantly less time these days!  Gratitude and thanks will take much less time to find their way back to you in this case.

So I guess, for me at least, it really is those small everyday acts that should be foremost in our minds as the holidays roll up and over us like some kind of runaway SUV.  And despite this wordy post recommending otherwise, please allow me say Thank You to each of you for reading these posts and supporting my efforts to share.

And one other thing to be thankful for:  Last Day of November Rainbow

Another cousin story for you

I believe I've shared what I have discovered so far about Marguerite (Innocencia) Coffarelli, your grandfather James' oldest sister.  She married Marco Disabto (or Disabato) and they lived for a time with her father John.  Her husband died around 1924 leaving her with 8 children (so far).  I continue to work on her story especially trying to determine when she died and where she is buried.  She may have died around 1950, but I don't have that confirmed yet. 

This afternoon I decided to take this task on just to see what came up, and--boy, did it pay off with a very interesting story.

This soldier is a cousin to your mother and her brother Uncle Johnny.  After he died and was awarded a Purple Heart and Silver Star, his mother waited FIVE long years before he was returned to native soil.

This article makes it seem as though this was kind of normal procedure although today it seems pretty appalling and cruel.  But I think that reflects the cultural attitude of the mid forties during wartime.  The papers are full of enthusiastic articles such as this one (which kind of breaks my 2011 heart)

These articles are full of tidbits of information I think I might be able to use to round out the story of this Disabto family.  The first thing I did after discovering this new surname was to check you mother's old address book, but I saw no one with this name so I'm wondering if this was truly a lost branch of the family.  You all would know better than I, but I figure if there's no one in her address book with that surname, then she plain did not know about them.  Anyhow, I have lots of juicy new clues to follow and you have new war hero cousin to read about. 

Happy Thanksgiving and safe travel to all!

For Labor Day this year, I wrote a piece about the loss of an historic tree on campus.  I also noted "It was necessary to take the tree down and I thought I would be one of a few "old timers" distressed by this but I was wrong!  Recently graduated students put up a Facebook page mourning the passing of this tree! I was very surprised by their reaction.  It took taking that tree down for me to know there are other (younger generation) people who cared about it too.  I think that discovery will help overcome my feeling of loss.  There will be something out of place about that hole in the front yard, but I take comfort in knowing I"m not alone in missing the great tree." 

The "recently graduated student" who made the Facebook Group  RIP The Harpursville Tree: 1426-2011  died in a car crash this past weekend.  He had been visiting his sister Abby in Geneseo and had just left to return to school at RIT when the accident occurred.  No alcohol, drugs or excessive speed involved.  Just one of those tragic accidents you read about but don't think too hard about until it hits home. 

The entire family are close friends of ours.  Abby and Ryan are very tight.  This has hit us hard.  We are struggling.  It's tragically ironic that Dan, a 21 year old Eagle Scout engineering student, put together this Facebook group about this tree because creating a Facebook group was on his bucket list.  And now they are both gone and there are huge holes left behind.  I wonder if he would be surprised at the impact his short life has made on so many adults in our community.  I understood taking the tree.  I don't understand this and I know I"m not meant to. 

So, I guess I'm sharing this with you all as yet another reminder to hug the ones you love as often as you can. 

Empty Nest Take 2

We are nearing the end of our first Empty Nest Take 2 weekend!  And it's all a little disorienting.  My sister found a job in Binghamton as well as an apartment, so we moved her this week.  So James and I are starting over mostly having only one another for company.  Unless Ryan calls at the last minute to bring home two friends for dinner and some paint-balling (that was yesterday).  Like the Aladdin song: "It's a Whole New World"--he's shampooing the rugs as I am writing this!!

The time change is welcome but is also a little disorienting at first.  I spent the entire day reading the entire book What Alice Forgot.  It's about a woman who gets knocked in the head and loses 10 years of her memory.  It's been too long since I've read a book from start to finish in just a day or two.  And it made me think a great deal about what was going on in my life 10 years ago and what has changed in the meantime.  Again, disorienting.

We went to an auction Friday night and brought home some ephemera that intrigued me.  I have had a wish that someday I would "rescue" pictures or family documents and return them to a family member interested in them.  Going through the various letters, dance cards and pictures has introduced me to Howard Evans who served with the Marines during World War I as well as being a member of the Hamilton College Glee Club.  I think I have enough information in the material we bought at auction to formulate a little story about Howard and perhaps find some descendant family members.  Most of the material is from the early part of the 1900s up through 1935 or so.  More disorientation as to time and place but in a really fun way (for me).  There's some really neat stuff in these boxes to entertain both James and I. 

So, to bring you to mid 20th century; here's your great grandmother's (Grandma Jennie) obituary and death notice from November 12 1953: