Grateful for life … with only two ‘ughs’

That year, I believed it was time we moved back to Savannah to be with her mother and father who were getting advanced in years,  Lynn came kicking and screaming, as did our daughter, Abby, but I prevailed.

After one year, Lynn came around, made new friends and retained special ones from her Atlanta days and we have continued our May week at N. Litchfield Beach, South Carolina with four couples from our Atlanta neighborhood. 2024 will be our 40th year, I believe.

Initially our children, who grew up together, came and could bring a friend, if they so chose, and in the morning we piled out of our large beach rental home like circus clowns exiting a car. The kids are all married, live all over, are raising their own kids so we are down to 5 couples. We are the only couple with great grandchildren.

We have a routine but, due to health issues, I no longer play tennis with my buddies so I read books, take a nap, and am in charge of making Margaritas. In the evening we generally play a game called left, right center with pennies and roll the dice to see what we do next.

I designed the house we live in at The Landings on Skidaway Island and with a gifted decorator, who helped us remodel our Atlanta home, who took my rough sketches, and scaled the rooms, and re-directed the stairs to the upstair bedrooms and sitting area.

Our home has a typical stucco exterior but inside it is open and contemporary because we are art enthusiasts and the ceiling is 9 feet downstairs. Our collection probably numbers some 300 items and runs the gamut.  In earlier years we traveled and always bought art to remind us of our trip and which we could afford so our collection includes Africa, Asia, European, and Native American objects. I particularly favor the American period in the early 1900s when America came into its own, i.e., the time of Théodore Dreiser’s novels, Gershwin’s music, Negro Jazz, Ash Can School artists, and you get the drift.

Our friends love our home, and there is little, after 22 years, we would change, except Lynn got shortchanged on a larger closet to accommodate her shoes.

I resigned my board membership on the State Museum (GMOA), on the University of Georgia campus, in Athens, after some 24 years because it was getting difficult to attend the meetings and our internationally recognized fabulous director, Bill Eiland, was resigning.

We have hosted the GMOA Board, we have had nationally known authors stay with us and give talks to groups of friends and our family piles in on various holidays. There is nothing pretentious about our home.  It is comfortable, like an old pair of shoes, and we know we, too, will have to downsize so we are apprehensive but realistic.

We have explored Maitland, Florida. where our real estate daughter lives and have no desire to move an inch north of Savannah.  My side of the family (I am an only child) numbers 30. In August it will rise to 31 as our fifth great grandchild is born and our last unmarried oldest grandson just married a lovely Californian.

At 90, soon to be 91, my own years are numbered and my goal is to make sure Lynn does not have to undertake a move by herself. We have begun the painful art object de-accession process but it ain’t going well because every time we give something away we re-fill the empty space with another object. UGH.

Life has been good to us and we consider ourselves blessed. Speaking for myself, I have done more than I ever could have imagined, met incredible people, had amazing experiences, have great friends, a wonderful family of productive, talented offspring and a marriage to a unique woman who, everyone wonders, how she hung in there. They call her a saint.

However, Lynn won’t let me get a dog. We came home one day after Abby’s soccer game with a Bichon Frise, named Hairy.  He lived 17 years and we had to put him down. One of the saddest days of my life.  I still keep his fleece rug by my desk. We waited for Abby to come from Maitland to bid him goodbye. Another UGH.