Tag Archives: Mary Poppins

Promises

Posted on September 11, 2014 | 1 comment

It was 46 degrees when I took out the dog early this morning. It’s not even mid-September but the trees are beginning to change color already after a cool summer.Then I hear from relatives that it’s 100 degrees and paint will not dry.

Feed the birds, tuppence a bag. I think of a film I saw several times in my childhood, Mary Poppins and its story, Saving Mr. Banks. Ms. Goff re-created a well-loved fantasy to cover her reality.

I wonder if all great artists are the production of uncaring, abusive or ill parents. I’ve been thinking of a book but even with thousands of posts I don’t know that I’ve the angst to do it because I had a pretty good childhood and life. Perhaps I could do it just for money. I don’t think so, unless it was to feed and house my family and that would not be a book.

Family promises were unwritten. We got to go to the Library every Saturday and check out a few books. My husband and I exchanged vows, promises, nearly 12 years ago and he’s living 2,000 miles from us.

The trees are changing and the flag is at half mast (I don’t know who died) and the wind is not coming from the east, so no Mary Poppins. While I always loved Feed the Birds, I always had a fancy for the penguins and flying carousel horses. Best, Dee

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Words

Posted on September 8, 2014 | 2 comments

When I used the guest bathroom at my Aunts’, both were English teachers who are going to scold me for my punctuation but not necessarily for content or spelling.

There was the big old OED, yes, a dictionary, on top of the toilet. By the time I got out I was supposed to have chosen a new word, its’ meaning and use it in a sentence.

It is interesting that my husband was read the Encylopaedia Brittanica by his, she’s agreed 12 years ago to be OUR Nanny, starting very early in life. We also had a set of EB and I learned much from it just reading from day to day.

One may say we led separate lives and we did until later in life. We both had dairy, education (science vs. liberal arts), and a will to make life better both for business, non-profit organizations, and us.

Words are difficult when transmitted via phone or email. All I know is that my husband is sick with cold/flu and I’m 2,000 miles away and can’t make him chicken soup or herbal tea.

The answer is tuppence, feed the birds. I’ve seen Saving Mr. Banks again and perhaps childhoods like that made people more creative as they aged. I think we use words because we had good parents, and one had grandparents, to show us the way. Supercalifragisticexpealidociously yours, Dee

ps I never used that in a sentence or explained it. We must ask Mary Poppins!

 

 

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Presents

Posted on April 30, 2014 | Leave a comment

Sometimes my husband buys me flowers. It’s not often so it means something when he brings them home to me.

One could say that my job is to make his job/life easier. This week, so far I’ve made him Pedernales chili and Jacques Pepin’s Lamb Robert and bathed the dog.

My husband is known as the “human tornado” for what he does leaving wet towels, water everywhere and a mess whenever he enters the kitchen. He can also fix my computer and any electrical problem in a heartbeat. When we go on a trip I manage packing all clothing and the dog – he deals with electronics including laptops, cell phones and chargers. He always does the last sweep of home and hotel to make sure we have everything as another set of eyes is always an asset.

A few weeks ago we actually went out to the movies (sorry Netflix, Amazon) and saw Saving Mr. Banks. I was moved by it. While I continue to enhance my cooking repertoire for the person I love most, he bought me a precious gift.

It is an out-of-print book he had sent from London. The Complete Mary Poppins.

In this day of reality shows that really show the tawdry side of life, women who want a man who would not think years later to buy a Mary Poppins for his wife need a wake-up call.

Get an education, get a job. Be thoughtful for yourself and your family. Gals, it’s all about the inner beauty, intelligence and strength. From an old married gal, I married someone I like to sit with at breakfast and talk about the news and family updates. If all you want is one night, that’s what you’ll get. If you want a lifetime perhaps a Mary Poppins will come your way……. Dee

ps Look for a Mary Poppins always. She’s there in so many people you already know.

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Chopsticks

Posted on April 17, 2014 | Leave a comment

I called Nanny to tell her what a wonderful, marvelous, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious grandson I married. Today, I figured out that Mary Poppins dropped in and left some fairy dust behind that made our childhood street a wonderful place to live.

My husband usually gets off work and comes home around 7:00 so when he called (I was walking the dog and of course, forgot my phone) it was shortly after five and he was very ill.

I think it was food poisoning, certainly not intentional but I looked after him all weekend. He’s allergic to anything that swims so if someone dunks his french fries in oil that has been used to fry fish… that could do it.

While I normally cook, he was well enough to go out Sunday afternoon and got me some spicy tuna sushi. He forgot the chopsticks. Luckily a kind waitress at a local Thai restaurant, after hearing he did not use chopsticks, had fashioned a set with rubber bands that one would give a three year-old. I took off the rubber bands and used those.

So what did I get in the mail? A set of five Chinese bamboo chopsticks hand painted with Peking Opera facial masks.

A week after we met we talked marriage in a hypothetical way and I said it was always about the marriage, not the wedding. I also told him it was unfair for a potential wife to get an engagement ring. We eloped, but only because my parents were divorced and it was unfair of me to ask them to sit in a small room together.

As to jewelery, we got two matching rings for our wedding, I’ve two magnetic golf bracelets to stem my arthritis, a pair of earrings I’ve worn day and night for over ten years and last year, a silver Claddagh ring I’ve always wanted.

No diamonds, I married mine. As we go through life together I’ll remember that he doesn’t want me to carry in bulky or heavy stuff, so orders it online. And he bought me chopsticks when he doesn’t eat fish. This one’s for Tommy and all the birthday parties we had in our garage. Pin the tail on the donkey up there, kiddo. Dee

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Number 17 Cherry Tree Lane

Posted on April 16, 2014 | Leave a comment

We knew she vanished somewhere. Sometimes we got mail from all places, disconsolate spaces where children were sad and parents were well-intentioned.

He played the piano, and we sang along, I thought that my harmonies would always belong.

Mary came to visit, another street, it was our own and a great place to meet. She placed me together with mentors and friends, we all played ball and stayed ’til the end.

The end has come for one of our friends. Let us remember him as a kind gent. He gave us whimsy and science and nice, let us give our friend his own kind of spice.

Radio chatter is not my game, SOS is all that I can avail, but this was a master the Navy says too, farewell MB and we all love you. To Mrs. MB and Don, Dee

PS Don, I’ll have to work on the lyrics, this came from the heart.

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Tuppence

Posted on March 31, 2014 | Leave a comment

Feed the birds, tuppence a day. That’s four cents last I was in jolly old England. It paid a family to waste two pence per day for the joy of feeding the birds, rather than placing everything in the bank.

A kind word, a good deed, tuppence it is for me. I know that while happy, it was a sad tale Mrs. Travers told and I hope to see Mary Poppins, the movie and again, very soon. Dee

 

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