The day is dark. The nor’easter is already underway with a high wind warning which continues through Sunday. Right now we have gusts up to 26 miles per hour but gusts up to 60 miles per hour are predicted. Even the biggest, the topmost branches are bending. The leaves are curling. The rain should begin around one and will dump around three inches of rain through Sunday. Saturday alone will get an inch. I need to get a few things at the store. I expect the stores to be crowded just as they are before giant snowstorms or hurricane predictions so I may wait until the rain starts hoping that will keep the less intrepid indoors.

Henry will go out in the rain, but Nala will look out the door then back into the kitchen. None of my boxers have been lovers of rain. Now I wish I had put the storms in the door so I could leave the inside doors open. The dogs and I love to watch the rain.

The morning has been a good one. The coffee was delicious. I get my coffee from Atlas Coffee so it comes from a different place each month. I am now enjoying coffee from Guatemala. I ran out of light cream, but I still have vanilla ice cream I am using instead. It is so delicious I find myself drinking more coffee than usual. My sister gave me some lemon curd, just about my favorite way to eat lemons. This morning I put it on my toast. It was sweet and tasty. Both were a glorious way to start the day. Next, I finished all three puzzles in the newspaper. I felt triumphant.

My upstairs is in dire need of attention. My bedroom has clumps of dust and fur everywhere. The surfaces need to be dusted or polished. The bed needs changing. I have bags of laundry. I find my inner sloth has total control.

When I was a kid, my favorite place to spend a rainy afternoon was in my bedroom nestled under the covers. One window was close to the foot of my bed, and I’d watch the rain hit that window and roll down the panes. I’d have my over the headboard light on and I’d spend the afternoon reading. My room was always quiet, but I could hear the TV playing in the living room. My mother would be in the kitchen making supper. I could smell the food cooking. I’d stay reading until my mother called me down to supper. She’d fill my plate, hand it to me, and I’d sit at the table and eat. She didn’t sit with us, but she’d often stand at the counter to eat. I’d watch TV until bedtime then I’d read until my mother yelled up the stairs for me to turn off the light and go to sleep. Joys of life stay with us. I find it amazing that even now on rainy days I love to nestle under the covers and read.

The nights are chilly. In the morning the house is cold. It holds the night air. I have had to keep the back door shut because of the breeze, because the cool air is being blown down the hall to the den. Fall is in full swing.

The sunshine is sharper today. The breeze is so heavy everything constantly blows, turns, bends. We have a high wind warning and a coastal flooding warning. The nor’easter is close.

When I was a kid, I made memories without realizing they were being tucked away, saved in my memory drawers. Some have stayed hidden, but many have abruptly jumped into my head triggered by a smell or sight or sound. Yesterday we drove through the square of my hometown. My friend pointed at the shop where she got the best subs. We remembered Hank’s Bakery, and the smell of bread baking in Hank’s ovens which wafted through the square. I still see Hank’s though it has been gone a while. Woolworth’s and Grants disappeared a long time ago. I still lament the loss of Woolworth’s. Many of the old buildings, especially the banks, look the same but haven’t been banks for the longest time. I miss the old square with all its shops, with what seemed to be hundreds of pharmacies lining the street and with the people in stores and on the sidewalks carrying bags from their shopping. Every day the square lived.

Yesterday’s reunion was amazing. I hadn’t seen my old friends for decades, but we fit together as if we last saw each other yesterday. I think it is always that way with old friends with whom you have so many memories of growing up together, memories of events and places and things shared. We told funny stories. We laughed. We weren’t old for a while. We were back to then. We were retelling funny experiences and remembering people we haven’t seen for so long. One memory of when I was first in the drill team I found out one of my friends has the same memory. We were maybe around twelve and went to a party after a contest. It was my mention of the duplex where the party was, the one over fifty years ago, which triggered the memory of my friend from at the same party. Everyone else there was old, at least in our eyes. The guys shaved. The girls seemed so sophisticated, many in their late teens. Treva said she was so scared she stayed on the porch. I stayed in a corner, protected on three sides. I didn’t realize this memory stayed. I find it amazing, even strange, which memories, which happenings, get stored away for safe keeping in our memory drawers.

We have sun. It has become a lovely day, but a fall day at 64°. My house is even a bit chillier. The nights have all been in the 50’s, not cold enough yet for the leaves to change. The weatherman is predicting a nor’easter at the end of the week. Those storms bring strong winds, heavy rain and a wild surf. We on the coast get hit the hardest with the strongest winds and a higher tide. Sand is carried by the wind and beaches erode. They are terrific storms.

I have always been mesmerized by storms. I remember the hurricanes when I was a kid. I’d watch out the window. The wind was so strong the trees and bushes bent. The wind was loud, frightening. The old wooden windows rattled. The rain pelted against the glass. I remember the giant elm which stood across the street went down in the 1954 hurricane, Hurricane Carol. I heard it fall. Branches from other trees littered the grass and the streets. Yards were a mess. I remember my father got to work right away cleaning the yard. We helped by piling the branches we could carry. The best part was the small bonfire when my father burned the debris. It filled the air with that wonderful smoky smell, and the firelight shined in the late afternoon.

I remember the start of the rainy season in Ghana. It hadn’t rained for months. The ground was sand. The fields were empty. We knew it was coming when the days started to get humid. The nights got warmer. I remember one day when the sky got dark with grey-black, angry looking clouds, which darkened the day. When the rain started, it was torrential. I saw a lightning bolt strike the ground in front of my house. It looked like a kid’s drawing of lightning with crooked lines of light. It was so unexpected I jumped a bit. I had been watching from my small porch in the front of the house. I decided to go inside prompted by the lightning bolt and the metal roof of the porch.

I didn’t write any lists or chores for today. I seem to ignore them anyway. I’ll end up doing something impromptu, something which catches my eye. I do have my uke practice tonight. That’s it for sure.

Yesterday with all its rain has made for an ugly today, a damp, dark day. It is only 61°. The breeze is at times a wind. Being inside in my comfy clothes is cozy and warm. The dogs are napping beside me. The coffee is great. I like my morning.

This week I am attending a special event, a drill team reunion, a reunion of St. Patrick’s Shamrocks. I joined the junior drill team when I was ten. We never competed. We just learned how to march. We did that at the armory on Main Street, a brick building with a pool table, a hall filled with unit flags, offices and a wide empty room upstairs. It is now a hardware store. When I was part of the senior drill team, we practiced upstairs. Every Tuesday we learned our maneuver for the summer competitions. We were all friends. We went to St. Pat’s together. We grew up together. We stayed friends though we didn’t see other often though I do keep in touch with my friend Maria. She is the one who took the lead to get us all together. She and I started in the junior drill together. We have some fun memories. The best one is when we were fooling around while someone was getting help in marching and no one was watching us. Maria hit the floor and made enough noise to get yelled at while I just stood and looked innocent. I do that well, the innocent thing. She still blames me. I deny it and will always deny it. This denial drives her crazy so I do it often.

When I was a kid, I never wanted to learn things like sewing, crocheting or cooking. My mother tried to teach me, but I just wasn’t interested. It was in Ghana when I first baked cookies and sewed anything. I had a wall of windows in my bedroom, louvered windows. I wanted more privacy so I bought some cloth in the market, measured the length of the windows and cut the cloth. I used string underneath a sort of top hem which I sewed by hand with giant stitches. I then strung the curtain by the string across all the windows and attached each end to a part of the window. I thought it looked great as long as you looked from the outside or not too closely inside. I remember the curtain cloth was brown with decorative sections on the top and bottom and a plain light tan middle.

I baked sugar cookies for my first Christmas away. I had to make a 200 mile round trip for gas so I could use my oven. I hauled my gas cylinder by bus. The cylinder was bulky and oh so heavy when filled. I had cookie cutters from home my mother had sent me. I used a beer bottle as a roller. It took me a while to make the cookies and bake them, but it was all worth it. They were delicious. They were the start of my love for cooking and baking; however, the curtain wasn’t enough for me to want to sew anything beyond buttons.

Today is chilly at 64°. It is supposed to rain most of the day, and the darkness of the day and the color of the clouds have me waiting for the first drops. I’ve decided to put the storm door on the back door as cold air comes in at night because I have to leave the door open for the dogs to go out. I can feel the chill all the way down the hall. Summer is truly gone.

My father used to spend a whole Saturday taking down the screens and putting on the storms which had been stored in the cellar. He needed a ladder. That, of course, scared us all. First he would climb the ladder and take the screens off the windows one by one. Next he’d carry a storm up the ladder. He had to hook it at the top of the window. That was the dangerous step because he needed both hands. The storms were heavy as the frames were wooden so we watched and waited. He never fell, so unlike my father. He moved from window to window then to both doors. Once the storms were on, we seldom opened a window as we had to hook it at the bottom so it would stay open just a bit. Besides, the inside windows were drafty even with the storms so we had air, cold air, and sometimes even frost on the inside window glass. I used to use my nails and write a message in the ice.

My dad was a football fan. Every week he watched the Giants, his favorite team as there were no Patriots back then. He was a screamer. If there was a fumble or an interception, he’d let the players know his dissatisfaction. He used to carry in dinner or snacks and eat while watching. His spot was on the side of the couch at the arm rest. It was beside a table on which he had a program guide, a holder for his glasses, an ashtray, a book he was reading and a filled candy dish, usually with Hershey’s miniatures. Sometimes he’d hide special candy under the couch. It was always right below where he sat so not so great a hiding spot. We all raided his candy. He’d eat his Hydrox cookies with milk. My father was a snacker.

I’m watching the Patriots mostly, but I’ll sneak looks at the Sox game. It is amazing that baseball’s regular season is coming to an end. I was standing on the deck the other day, and the air felt like autumn. No trees have changed yet, but that is coming. Summer is riding off into the sunset to mix a metaphor. Fall will soon hold sway.

The morning is fall at 63°. We have a bright sun and a mostly blue sky. I have chores. Mainly I have to vacuum. I can’t walk down the hall without hair balls flying into the air. This is a dusty house.

I found one of my political buttons, one I hadn’t added to the framed collection of buttons hanging in the hall. Those buttons are for democratic candidates going as far back as Kennedy. The one I found in the drawer was one I had picked up just to collect, never to wear. The button is huge, round, sort of the size of a small pancake. In the middle is a smiling Richard Nixon. That alone is scary enough. Around the button it says at the top, “Nixon’s The One.” At the bottom it says, “Nixon For President.” It is from the 1960 election. I remember getting the button at the Nixon political headquarters, a store front, in my town. I was in the eighth grade. It was the first election to which I not only paid attention but also favored a candidate.

In the eighth grade, we had a field trip to the Museum of Science. That was a big event as it was the first and only field trip we ever had. We were given a worksheet with several questions relating to the exhibits. It seemed daunting. I had the idea that my friends and I would divide the questions and then share our answers. Because the answers were right out in the open for the finding, we had no qualms. We completed the entire sheet. We even saved enough time we watch some of the events. I remember sitting on the floor and watching Spooky the Owl. I was amazed when he could spin his head and flap his wings on command.

When I was in high school, a few of my friends and I went to Boston to see the movie Cleopatra. I remember we all got dressed up for our trip to the city. We were chauffeured in town by the bus and the subway. We walked from the subway stop to the Music Hall, now the Wang, to see the movie. I was awed by how beautiful and fancy the theater was. It had chandeliers and murals on the walls and ceiling and private balcony seating along the sides. The ladies’ room even had regal red velvet covered lounges. I sat on one for a while luxuriating in the elegance. I’ve never been to a more beautiful ladies’ room.

Such a lovely day! It is 72° and sunny. Last night it rained for a bit, little enough the dogs didn’t mind. I didn’t hear the rain. It was only Nala’s wet coat which let me know. This has been a slow morning. My TV keeps losing the Wi-Fi network, and it constantly buffers. I spent a while trying to figure out how to fix it. I was all over the place following suggestions. I hope I found the answer. If I haven’t, you’ll hear me screaming, even a few obscenities.

I just don’t want to do anything today, but I have to go out. My trunk already has some trash, and I need to add more then I’ll be off to the dump. I have no bread and Jack needs canned food. That means a stop at the grocery store. I’m not happy, but each is necessary. I miss my morning toast and Jack loves his canned food.

I have moments that fill my memory drawers. Some I could label surprises, happenings I didn’t expect or imagine. Others had always been wishes, some even expectations. I have images, pictures saved in their own drawers. They make me smile. They help me remember.

I think every Christmas of my childhood is in those drawers. I don’t remember ever being disappointed. I remember when I got my bike. I took it out on Christmas morning. We have a picture of me standing with it by the steps. My grin is almost too wide for the picture. I remember my first transistor radio. I can still see it in my mind’s eye. One Christmas, when I was maybe ten, I got this great new outfit of a skirt and fluffy sweater. I also got a gold medallion on a gold chain. I put everything on as soon as I opened it. I wore it to church that Christmas morning. I wanted everyone to notice. So many more Christmases are crammed into those drawers. Some are from when I was older. One of my favorites is my first Christmas in Ghana. I thought being away from home at Christmas would be the worst. It wasn’t.

My dad drove up Mount Washington. I remember looking over the side at how far up we were. I remember taking pause and being nervous when a car driving by our car on the inside of the road passed us. I remember how cold it was on top of the mountain. The hairpin turn on the Mohawk Trail was amazing. I kept looking out the back window to see where we’d been. The Eisenhower Locks are in one memory drawer. I watched as a ship went through. Later, the Panama Canal reminded me of that lock. My own travels fill drawer after drawer. First was Africa. I never thought I’d travel to Africa. I hold on so tightly to those years, to all the memories. I did Europe. That seemed a rite of passage for my generation. You had to include a backpack.

I have to stop here or I’ll go on forever.

Mother Nature has generously given us another summer’s day. It is already 75° with a bright sun and a few light clouds. We have a breeze. The weatherman says rain tonight.

When I was in the first grade, I had a stern nun, Sister Redempta. She scared all of us not only by her manner but also by her habit, all that black. On the Lone Ranger, bad guys wore black hats. We could see only her face and hands. She wore a rosary around her waist which made noise when she walked. When she spoke, we listened. None of us dared to speak out of turn. She’d have us fold our hands together in the middle of the desk. That was like calling us to attention. We used to have to stand up to talk, to answer questions. It was always, “Yes, sister. No, sister.” I think army basic training must be similar. We even wore uniforms though ours in the first grade were a bit different. Our skirts had over the shoulder straps. I still have my first grade school picture. I’m smiling. What is striking about it are my teeth. The two front teeth go in different directions. I’d get braces in second grade and in that school picture I’m not smiling. I’m hiding my braces. They weren’t so common back then. Luckily, metal mouth hadn’t yet hit playground taunting.

When I was a kid, I never liked tomatoes. I liked tomato soup and spaghetti sauce but not raw tomatoes, especially the hard ones from the grocery store. In Ghana onions and tomatoes were plentiful in the market. I didn’t eat them raw then either. They were sauce, almost a stew, in which the tough beef cooked for a long time to soften. I never ate a tomato in a sandwich. My subs were tomato less, lots of onions and hot peppers, but no tomatoes. I’d take them out of a burger from Carroll’s. I don’t know when my tastes changed. I’d add them to sandwiches and stopped picking them out of salads. Homegrown tomatoes are the stuff of legends. Small tables in front of houses by August are filled with tomatoes for sale. I keep small bills and change in the car so I can stop and buy them. A BLT toasted and slathered with mayo is a taste of heaven.

The morning is fairly quiet. Only Henry is noisy. He’s been barking. I have stopped checking why. Nala is spread out on the couch beside me. I do hear birds and occasionally a car. I have a concert this afternoon. I also need bread and cat food. I’ll join the world for just a little while.

The weather has the feel of fall about it. The morning temperature is a bit chilly, long sleeve chilly. The sunlight is sharp, the sky a clear blue, and the breeze ever so slight. Earlier, I sat on the deck steps to drink my coffee. Nala stayed with me. Henry went into the house. We each greet the mornings in different ways.

My life is pretty quiet. Most of my days are spent at home, just me and the dogs and Jack. I read or watch movies or do spot cleaning, my last resort. Ukulele gets me out of the house. I am still amazed I can actually play a musical instrument. I mostly live in my cozies. I am up until the wee hours. The nights are lovely. By then, my house is the only one with lights. We don’t have any street lights so the darkness is dense. I can hear birds and insects and every now and then Henry barks. When I finally go to bed, I fall asleep quickly.

I have a sort of morning routine. I read the paper, do all the puzzles and have two cups of coffee. Sometimes I have toast. I still slather it with fig jam if I have any. I then start writing Coffee and have YouTube on in the background. Often I watch the walks through Accra, Ghana. I feel as if I am there. I know the sounds and the smells. I recognize the aunties selling their wares along the sidewalks. They haven’t changed in all these years. I see fruits and vegetables and clothes on mannequins with no arms. Pots and pans in different sizes are piled. Tinned goods are stacked. It is all so familiar.

When I was a kid, my grandparents were the oldest people I knew. They were quite different, my mother’s parents and my father’s. We loved to visit my mother’s parents in East Boston. They were warm and loving. They lived in a city we could explore. On weekends, their house was a meeting place for all the siblings. My mother was the third of eight. I had what seemed like hundreds of cousins. I still picture my grandmother. She was short, the whole family was mostly short. She wore a bib apron usually with flowers. She wore slippers with the backs down. Her stockings were rolled down to her ankles. She was not really cheery. She sometimes wore a tired smiled.

My other grandmother was a tall woman, taller than my grandfather. She stooped. She also wore a bib apron with a flowered dress underneath. Her shoes were always black with clunky heels. She had a laugh that was always too loud, strident. My father visited them most Saturdays as they lived in the same town as we did. The rest of us seldom visited. They weren’t very welcoming. Once in a while they did invite us to dinner. I remember one time going on Thanksgiving night for a second turkey dinner. They had a dining room. The furniture was dark. It is funny what you remember.

The rain stayed around most of yesterday, but, by late afternoon, Mother Nature had finally gotten tired of pelting us with all that rainwater. The sky lightened, the dogs went out and the night had stars. Today is a perfect fall day. It was 62° this early morning, but the temperature has already creeped up to 72°. The breeze is constant, strong. The trunks are swaying and the leaves are spinning. I can hear them swishing.

When I was a kid, fall was my favorite season. I loved all the colors. I loved the crisp mornings. The air was always clear, almost shimmery in the light. Summer humidity was finally gone. My mother used to make us wear a light jacket which, by afternoon, was too warm. I’d put it in my school bag for the walk home. Most afternoons I’d quickly get out of my school clothes into my play clothes. My neighborhood friends and I would sometimes play games on the street like Red Rover. We all knew the strategy. Pick the weakest player who probably couldn’t break the hand chain. We played Simon Says and Red Light. Other afternoons I’d bike ride, but I never went far from home. The street lights came on too early. That was fall afternoon’s only drawback.

Supper was more formal than in summer. We always had meat, mashed potatoes and a vegetable. My mother’s meatloaf was one of my favorites. Sometimes she’d put ketchup on the top and cover the ketchup with bacon. We fought over the bacon. It was always wonderfully crisp. Other times she used mashed potatoes like frosting. She’d cover the beef and put it back in the oven. The tips of the potatoes browned. It looked like a baked Alaska. We never had baked beans during the week. They were only for Saturdays. We had corn, niblets and creamed, baby peas, cut carrots which we ate reluctantly and green beans, mostly French green beans. I remember watching Leave It To Beaver and The Donna Reed Show. They always had a stack of white bread on the dinner table. We never did. Dessert was mostly cookies from the supermarket. I am and will forever be an Oreo Fan.

Lately I have been testing Oreo flavors, some new, some already traditional. Double Stuffed and Mega Stuffed are just perfection. I’ve had the Golden Oreo and liked it, but it took a while to get use to as Oreos were always chocolate when I was a kid. Mint and Peanut Butter are easy to like. I just tasted Banana Pudding Oreos. Okay, a taste doesn’t cover it. I ate the whole package. I also ate the whole package of Deep Fried Oreos. It wasn’t in one sitting but over time. I will never buy them again. They are so good they will never last. I‘d be making several trips to the kitchen for handfuls. Now I’ll just dream of my Oreos.