Mother Dear

Our sainted mother, Louise Francis Bailey, turned 92 years old this past Monday. The four of us sibs, Marilyn, Suzy, Bob and I took her out to a very nice dinner at Lark's, in the Ashland Springs Hotel.
The staff were attentive and kind, young folks who worked hard and paid attention to the whole room, not just us.

That's Bob in the background. I tell you the old girl has not lost her sense of humor. Back in the day Bob and I could bring her to tears pretty much at will when we got going goofing around.

Mom doesn't walk so good these days, and when the hostess saw us hobbling up the sidewalk at such a painful pace she unlocked a secret side door and brought us in that way saving a good deal of effort. That set the tone.
The food was very very good, kind of local-source nouvelle-europo, I'm told the wine was outstanding, and they even scraped up a fake beer for me, which was pretty good, too, even if I did leave half of it in the glass, a thing that was absolutely unknown before  my apotheosis.
The staff and even all the other diners sang Happy Birthday as they brought out a little cake with a candle, and there was a round of  applause from the whole room when Mom took a very matter-of-fact deep breath and then casually blew the candle right on out.

Sister Suzy on the left, she lives in LA, Marilyn in the middle, an Ashlander, and Betsy Bailey who is Bob's wife were as thrilled as I was when the cake came around...

We finished and the little plastic cards and the cash came out, and then, content with our evening, we bade good-bye to each other on the sidewalk, and the three of us Northerners hopped in Bob's bright red diesel Golf and flew on back to Salem, where I, for one, slept like a happy little log.