Memorial Day

May 30 Memorial Day

Out of town family
visited yesterday.
We like to play cards,
when we get together,
and cook a nice meal.
For dinner, my brother-in-law
and I made a rice, hamburger,
onion concoction held together
with ketchup, and spooned
into bell pepper halves.
My mother made this for
us growing up, sans the onion,
and this was one of our favorite meals.
She joined us yesterday in the
card games and the laughter and the meal.
And we looked at family photos,
told stories of past vacations,
like crossing the Salt Lake desert
in a Buick or Ford Station wagon
pulling the cord on an evaporative
air cooler that mounted in the
passenger side window.
A open-ended cylinder
about 6 or 8 inches of diameter,
and 18 inches long, mounted
in the passenger side window.
Inside it was a mesh which
when you pulled the string,
rotated in water which we needed
to refill at regular intervals,
and through which the moving air
of our car's motion resulted in a
somewhat cooling stream of air
coming in to the
passenger compartment
across that very hot desert.
We also shared the various goings on
in the family: a new grand niece
is due in November, surgical
procedures are scheduled,
new jobs have been had.
We memorialized those who have passed
and enjoyed the company of,
and were sometimes irritated by,
those of us still here.