My Lifelong Childhood

" Ah, Sun-flower!  weary of time  Who countest the steps of the Sun;  Seeking after that sweet golden clime,  Where the traveller's journey is done;                              William Blake (1757-1827) So....it's been two months since my last blog, not for want of respite, but rather being busy, traveling, afflicted with a dry spell for topics, and attending to projects piling up on my desk.  One, among the latter, has been working on my application for dual citizenship in Portugal which is progressing nicely, thank you.  People greet me with a puzzled look when I tell them about this but my answer is that, in uncertain times, it's best to have a back-up plan should things go south. This is certainly not for any lack of patriotism, for I love my country more than you'd ever know.  Chalk it up to my anxiety about where we might be headed.  Why Portugal, you ask?...

"A house divided against itself cannot stand..."                         Abraham Lincoln 1809-1865 Coming up to the second anniversary of my blog, I realize I have steered clear from what my parents always warned me never to discuss in polite company: Politics, Sex and Religion.  Well guess what? After many years on this earth, I've decided I no longer have to be polite.  After waking up each morning ( and sometimes in the middle of the night), I'm having my Howard Beale moment..."I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take this anymore!...".  The divisiveness of our world is weighing heavy on my mind.  I've avoided, thankfully, resorting to drugs and heavy drinking.  I do have my vices, such as sitting here writing this listening to Dionne Warwick on my Bose, singing old Bert Bacharach songs, or tearing up when I watch sentimental movies.  I still get the shivers when I listen to Elgar...

"Ay, Ay, to be sure, there are secrets in all families..."                                             George Farquar (1678-1707) from " The Beaux Stratagem" I call my blog "My Lifelong Childhood" because childhood is a time of discovery and exploring.  This story explains why I continue on this quest. It's been a little over a month since my last post but, in a nutshell, I've been busy!  In some of my earlier blogposts, I had mentioned discovering relatives I didn't know I had, all because of family secrets.  Once uncovered, the findings have blossomed into warm relationships.  Such was the case of my great-Aunt, Mathilde (Tillie) who had followed her brother, Leon, my grandfather, to America from Vienna in 1913 after his arrival in 1905, having established himself in business.  There was never any mention of Tillie during my entire youth and I ...

"Taste as Nature has endowed us with it is still that one of our senses which gives us the greatest joy...because it can mingle with all the other pleasures, and even console us for their absence"                  Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, The Physiology of Taste                                   (1755-1826) M.F.K. Fisher once wrote "Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly".   Since early childhood, the enjoyment of food has been one of the scaffolds on which I have built my life.  That is not to say it's an obsession or mission but, rather, the natural culmination of my exploration of life.  While growing up en famille , our household always had dinners together, my mother doing all the cooking despite having a full-time career as an interior decorator.  Her meals ...