A Grand Week Away

Sam and I have been out of town for the last week, visiting his parents in another state. Let me give you a rather impressionistic account of our time away.
Papa and Mama were thrilled to have us with them couldn't do enough (from their perspective) to make us feel at home--and pampered. They woke up every morning at 5:30 to shower, tidy up the house, and wait for us to wake up. Being on another time zone, they had some waiting to do--and they did it very patiently. It was delightful to drag out to the kitchen in the morning to find hot German pancakes, scrambled eggs, slices of mango, and orange juice waiting for us at the table. Papa would say the most fervent prayer over our food and then off we'd go, with gusto.

Our first day was spent visiting property the folks have recently purchased in an adjacent state. I was struck by how green and serene it was there, out in the country. Twenty acres of the most flat, but green land, and three little dwellings on it. They hope to build homes there for themselves and two of their sons. There, we met Fred--an obese, good-natured, old dog. He looked part Corgi and part German Shepherd. He also looked like he couldn't get out of his own way. Rumor is that he is vicious, but that was hard to believe, looking down at him resting his chin on my knee and begging for a good scratching behind the ears.

We went into town and ate at a wonderful little restaurant in a bend of the road. The menu items presented a problem for Papa. His Puerto Rican rules of speech dictated that Cajun chicken was pronounced "Cahoon," for which he received much ribbing from all of us.

Papa's Puerto Rican cooking left us flopping happily about in the livingroom--helplessly full and sleepy. His chicken and rice, full of fresh cilantro and sofrito, cooked for several hours. The house smelled absolutely marvelous.

Sam and I slept on a platform air mattress in the study. The folks have a small two-room house, which put us in a very small room. It took us about three nights to adjust to the mattress, letting air out of it so we didn't feel as though we were sleeping on a very slippery, shifting board. If Sam turned over quickly, I could fly up in the air.

Mama and I spent a day shopping through several huge gourmet food and European cooking stores. I loved the freedom to be able to do this. No pager, no calls on the cell phone, no time crunch. We just meandered through the aisles of fresh herbs, cheeses, and freshly baked breads, oohing and ahhing about everything we saw.

I sang at my in-laws' church during the visit. I was to sing twice that morning. The pianist at their church played like the house afire, and we raced through what was to have been a meditative song of preparation for communion.
Why are sound technicians the same, the world over? As the pianist plowed through the introduction, he gestured to me as if to ask whether the monitor in front of the podium was up too loud or not. I motioned for it to be turned down, since I couldn't even hear myself think. I could see him up in the balcony sound box turning a knob before he disappeared from sight into a little back office. He took no interest in me thereafter, even though my microphone at the podium was nearly turned off. How could I know enough to tell him to turn down my mic when in fact I had not yet sung when I motioned to him? There I stood, singing my heart out, not being heard over the piano's broad, crashing chords. It dawned on me that people looked somewhat dismayed, but I thought that they could be deep in reflection about the words I was singing. Later I realized that they couldn't even hear me. I was to have sung during the communion service proper, but the organist hijacked the congregation with a great Bach toccata that took up the entire time. Papa was livid, ready to tear someone's head off for not being more organized, causing me to be preempted. Since according to my time zone, the time I was really singing was at 7:00 a.m., I was grateful to get away with only one strained song.

In reflection, this was the first time I was a guest with Sam's family of origin. I've met his brother and have visited with his parents before. But we never stayed with them. This visit made me feel part of a second family--something I never anticipated, what with being single for so many years. Probably many people take in-laws for granted. I have waited many, many years to have some. Seeing Papa suddenly puff up and start to sing a Spanish love song to Mama in the kitchen; to laugh with Mama about an idiosyncracy shared by our Sams (Jr. and Sr.); to hear Papa tell his friends, "These are my cheelren": this warmed me. To find that I fit in, that they love me dearly, and that I love Sam more after being there--this is the best result of my trip away. We made many good memories. It was grand indeed.