A family dinner

 

On our way to dinner

It’s wonderful to have family and friends share the high points in your life, as we did Friday night celebrating Jacob and three other Paschal High School graduates. But sometimes, a quiet family night is nice too. The four of us went to dinner at Pacific Table last night. Jacob got to choose the restaurant. It was a gorgeous evening again, and we sat on the patio. Yes, the wait for service was long, but we were talking and reminiscing. Jacob ordered, as he usually does, Caesar salad. This night it came in long, uncut leaves, and as he attacked it with a fork, I gently (well I tried) pointed out that the salad, invented in Mexico, was originally finger food. You were to pick up each leaf, with a dollop of dressing on the far end, and eat it. Jacob’s response? “I’m kind of liking the fork.” So much for food history. We lingered until dark—a thoroughly pleasant evening. We don’t often have Jacob’s company in the evening, which made this special.

My cone flowers in the front yard have really spread this year with all the rain we’ve had. I asked Christian if when the flowers go to seed, he could capture some seeds and spread among the wildflowers in the back yard to introduce a new color or at least a new shade of pink. He explained that the plants all have runners and that’s how they spread. But we reasoned they must also have seeds, so if anyone has any hints about sharing the wealth from front to back, please let me know.

Son Jamie just blew into town, literally blown in before what promises to be a storm. Thunder was rolling a few minutes ago and the sky was dark—briefly it was silent, the air very still, and then came the rain. A good medium rain, hard enough to soak in but not to wash away things. Jame will stay the week, helping with my doctor appointments, errands, etc. He brought his Pomeranian, Cosmo, and we had the great introduction of Benji and Cosmo. Benji was of course excited out of his mind, while Cosmo tried to pretend nothing was happening. Given one chance, he bolted out the patio door to the yard, but of course Benji followed him. After only one half-hearted scuffle, they settled down to the butt-sniffing stage. But Benji is very jealous of any attention Jamie pays to Cosmo.

Benji learned a new trick today but I’m quite sure he will unlearn it quickly. The walker was next to me at my desk when suddenly I was aware that Benji’s face was in mine. He had crawled up on the walker, which promptly began to move under him, leaving him scrambling to get his feet on the floor again. Then just now Jamie left, with Cosmo, to get Mama’s Pizza (high school memories die hard) and Benji got so excited he jumped on the credenza next to me where I keep racks of file folders. Two jars of dog treats went down, but I caught the file folders in time. Pray for me—it’s going to be a long week.