Paul McCartney and the Cut Glass Tumbler of Trust

A few minutes ago, after I said to myself, "What the hell, there's only an inch of wine in that bottle", I discovered Paul McCartney singing songs of the generation that came before annoying. For me, he remains the voice of the baby boomers, not the bobby soxers. He was one over-thirty person that I thought I could trust.

  

This profound thought came to me as I washed dishes from a lunch I fixed for my son, but eventually consumed by my neighbor. The threat of a terrifying ice storm curtailed our mother-son bonding, and Nancy, walking her dog, became an easy invitation for helping me reduce the amount of chicken soup. You see, I don’t like leftovers. I find them tired and old and not a better dish after the flavors all meld together. I like fresh.

And yet, I dare to tell an old story. I will begin with a fresh-made lesson from today. Don’t place travel coffee mug tops, the rubber malleable ones that bend and slide on like condoms, in the silverware bin in the dish drainer. Very sharp, pointy knives may poke through them and create a joke coffee mug. Which by the way, in the morning is not funny.

I envisioned the horrors of a sweater or fresh shirt perfectly matched for the day, soiled by dribbles of coffee. I know this to be a real threat. My connect-the-dot brain vividly remembers a visit to Uncle Harry and Aunt Laura, who were sibling to my grandmother. As I write this, I side-step in memory to my father’s funeral and reading my Uncle Harry’s name, affixed in brass, as the benefactor of the oak throne used for the priest’s respite during his duties saying  Mass. Clearly, Uncle H. had money, pull and always, the highest esteem of my father.

Which brings me to Aunt Laura, who thought it hilarious to give an eight year old a cut glass tumbler etched with branches, each with many many minute leaves. I remember Aunt Laura chuckling as I examined the glass and liquid dribbled down my arm, then hooting uncontrollably, in a Julia Child-like laugh, when ginger ale splashed from the holes in the middle of some leaves and spotted my turquoise dress.

I remember the dress. I remember the chair, the end tables, the lamp, the drapes and her curly “done” hair back lit, a halo from the windows behind where she sat. I remember sitting between my parents, my father in a flowered chair my mother and me on a settee. I remember that my mother smiled looking first at Aunt Laura then turning her back to her and  snarling, her lips pursing as she frantically wiped my chest with her cocktail napkin before the soda spattered the Aunt’s floor.

ITunes moved beyond McCartney to Rodriguez and the dishes are dry like the bottle. When I put the them away, I will test the travel mug lid. It just isn’t worth trusting what once was safe. 

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p.s., If you hit the McCartney link, you'll hear his new-old music. When I hear it mixed with more modern, it get diluted and more palatable. I still LOVE the Beatles.