08 August 2010

Nothing Much Else Happened: August 8, 1978

★ Highlight Day

Today, we flew to Florida and met Aunt Sherry at the airport. On the way home she said she had a surprise. When we got there, I found out the surprise was my favorite maid, Alberta! We had a meatloaf sandwich for lunch and then I went out to their gameroom and shot some pool (the first pool I've played in 3 years) They have a new dog named "Foots", and I went out to see him, but he wasn't there. Aunt Sherry thought that Uncle Don had taken him to the vet. But when Uncle Don got home, no "foots"! We figure someone let him out. For dinner, we went to Morrison's. I love their custard pie so I had 2 for dessert.

***

So much to explain in this entry.

First of all, that was two slices of custard pie at Morrison's Cafeteria — not two entire pies.

Secondly, I do make at least one more reference to Foots' disappearance, but it was confirmed after our departure that he had been stolen: a neighbor spotted a pickup truck pull up into their driveway next door, take Foots from his kennel, load him in the back and take him away. (The neighbor mistakenly thought that the thieves had done this with Uncle Don's approval.)

And lastly ... *sigh* ... Alberta. I've always struggled with this, but I can't deny the fact that my mother's father was wealthy enough to have full-time maids — sometimes two at a time. Considering the amount of time I spent at my grandfather's house as a child, it was somewhat inevitable that I became quite close to them, especially Alberta Tooley. She was more than a maid; she was practically my nanny for a number of years, and for all my subsequent visits to Florida. (She also came and visited us in California a number of times as well.) As strange as it is to talk about my family's maid, I have to say that Alberta was one of my closest friends in my childhood.

All punctuation and spelling has been retained precisely as I wrote it 32 years ago at age 12.

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