Sunday I had the privilege of attending a birthday party for my neighbor, Nancy L, who is celebrating her 90th year. It was my privilege to help her with the planning of this party, which was originally going to be managed by her daughters. She took control of the planning after some bickering broke out (naturally!) between the siblings. How much of that actually occurred requiring parental intervention versus Nancy's desire to be in charge, I do not know. Anyway, my contribution was to go through Nancy's contact list for her to choose her guest list. I copied and pasted them into the body of an email to forward to her granddaughter-in-law who was taking care of the Evite. After we took care of that, we played a quick game of Scrabble which Nancy kindly allowed me to win, as my reward!
As she already knew, I was going to be late because after church we had a Ladies' Group meeting which I needed to attend, as its President. Three times she asked me if I was coming, and three times I reminded her, and the Evite manager, that I was coming, but might be late. The time of the party was changed by an hour, due to the time change, which allowed me to arrive just as the plates were being served. As I scanned the room for my seat, I was waved at by a friend, Terreca, and they took good care of me with a plate of food, a cup of ice (I brought my own soda!), and some tablewear to eat it with. Such nice folks at the table!
I mention the Scrabble game because everyone had a name tag on, made from miniture Scrabble tiles! One of Nancy's daughters came around and informed me that I had a name tag waiting for me at the entrance and went to get it for me. I was wearing my generic name tag that I keep in my purse. Jackie brought me the name tag and explained that they had trouble with the Ks as they fashioned the name tags, so they had to overwrite the labels used to make them. I remarked that it was like some of Nancy's Scrabble tiles, as she has replaced lost tiles using large buttons, with a letter and its value written on them. Fortunately it was not the Ks that needed replacement. It is difficult, impossible, to keep it a secret when you draw one of the button tiles, but she doesn't seem to care about that, so I try not to either. More than once I had offered to order replacement tiles for her, but she loves the buttons so I won't take away her fun from her. It is my hope that she continues to allow me to play with her, and occasionally allow me to win! She is one sharp cookie!
Neighbors Kay, Nancy, and Jane at
The Palace Book Club
