What a Week.
Wow. It's only Thursday? This week has seemed to drag on forever.
Let's see...we had our home staging, put the house on the market, one of our kitties passed away, there was an earthquake, Caroline had her first day of school and we're expecting a hurricane. You think that's enough to deal with at one time? Because when I put with that we lost the bid on the house we liked in Maryland, my Grandfather remains in very fragile health, I worked two days in Leominster and we had an article in the paper about what we found in our house as we were renovating and have had people knocking on our door about it...frankly, I'm overwhelmed. And so tired I'm about to cry. Oh - I forgot I'm a guest blogger this week on another blog and have to write my post tonight.
Too much.
I know it could be so much worse. And I think I've done a pretty good job at keeping things in perspective. A good night of sleep would be a wonderful thing.
The worst part of the week was Junior being put down. He had developed some behaviors that had worsened as he got older that made him un-adoptable. We wracked our brains and our hearts trying to figure out what we needed to do. Ultimately, it wasn't okay for him to be around with the kids. While we know we did the right thing, it didn't make it any easier. In fact, I think that trip to the vet might of been the hardest thing I've ever done. We were with him when he died, which haunts me. I'm glad we were there, though.
As much as the Stinker made me crazy, I miss him. A lot.
I can't tell you how strange it is to not have him brush up against my legs looking for a handout as I'm cooking dinner. Or to sit on the couch and not have him put a paw on my shoulder. Or to lay down in bed and not have him try to knead my armpit and stick his wet nose in the crook of my neck while he was purring like a motorboat. Heck, I can even sit down on the toilet without a cat sitting on my lap. It's weird. I cry when I'm sweeping because I see clumps of Junior hair on the floor (I think there will be Junior hair in this house years from now). I cry when I pet Smokey because it's obvious she's lonely.
Explaining what happened to the kids was tough. They rolled with it. I think they were more concerned because I was so sad. Caroline had a lot of questions about the actual death process and if Junior rose to heaven after he died. She inquired today if he was already buried.
We'll get used to not having him around, I know.
I hope he's rolling in the catnip and eating all the cat treats he can possibly stomach in the great kitty Beyond.
Rest in Peace, Junior. I love you.
I'll get the pictures of Caroline's first day of school up later on.
Oh - and I forgot that Nate is walking.
Everywhere.
And climbing.
Everything.
That adds yet another dimension to the craziness.
But in a good way.
This article in today's Telegram was the object of much discussion. Like I said before, I even had people in the neighborhood knock on the door and ask to see the house because they hung out at the house as kids. =-)
A few weeks ago, while jackhammering our front steps, we (our contractor) found a time capsule put there by the neighborhood kids in 1977 when the original steps to the house were being re-done. The article in the paper explains a lot of what was found. The best part has been how this has brought us closer to people in the neighborhood that we didn't know before. It makes me even more sad to leave. This is a wonderful place to raise a family. I am hoping the article in the paper will make people aware of our home and help us get a good family in the house. =-)
From today's Telegram Towns section:
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Thursday, August 25, 2011
Time in a bottle
Memories of 1977 unearthed at house
From left, landscapers Eric Stolberg, Bob Murphy and Barbara Mitchell, and homeowners Karen and Jim Watson. The home, where the time capsule was found under the front steps, was owned by the McKeon family. (T&G Staff Photos/CHRISTINE PETERSON)
Baseball cards found inside the time capsule include a card for Butch Hobson. Enlarge photo
A coupon for Whalom Park was included among the items buried in the time capsule. Enlarge photo
WORCESTER — David Markowitz doesn’t remember April 18, 1977, a spring day he spent with a gang of neighborhood children in the Paradox Drive area where they all grew up.
“It was pre-Xbox,” Markowitz recalls with amusement. “Kids found things to do.”
In good weather, that amusement was outdoors, riding bicycles or playing at neighbors’ homes. Mr. Markowitz does remember cracking his skull in a childhood accident and needing stitches and spending a lot of time in the McKeon family’s driveway at 63 Paradox Drive, which had a basketball hoop.
The memory of those spring days when a gang of children could roam the neighborhood in what was arguably a safer time may be a blur. But a recent find at the former McKeon family home is bringing some of it back into focus, as new owners Jim and Karen Watson renovated their steps and uncovered a piece of memorabilia from that time, put there by Mr. Markowitz and his friends.
The Watsons most likely viewed the renovation of their front steps as routine as they prepared the home they’ve owned for six years for sale. The concrete required a jackhammer and sledgehammer to remove, and in the process, the contractor uncovered a glass milk jug (remember those?) full of bits and pieces that the Paradox Drive children believed represented their world.
Ellen McKeon, whose name appears in the time capsule along with Dohertys, Elkinds and Edenbergs, says Shay Taylor, who was rebuilding the steps, came up with the idea. The time capsule’s contents reflect the influence of the sports-minded: several Sports Illustrated and Sports Digest covers, and baseball and football cards bearing the names that will bring back memories for many: Johnny Bench, Butch Hobson, Freddy Patek, Luis Gomez, Pat Toomay, Joe Morgan, Bobby Clark and Rick Barry.
The capsule also contained a lottery scratch ticket (bingo, not a winner); several sheets of homework; a bottle of Excedrin; Markowitz’s junior membership card to Trout Unlimited; a parking ticket from Harvard Street (not a surprise to those who have tried to park there); coupons to Whalom Park; a postcard, with postage (6 cents); and a magazine story about hand-held portable televisions.
The names of all the children and young people present that day were recorded on a piece of paper with their names and ages.
Two young men signed a letter found along with the cache, Markowitz and neighbor John Knowlton, were young teens when the time capsule was buried.
Their letter is short and to the point:
To whom it may concern,
Why did you break the steps?
This time capsule was buried April 18, 1977.
Make sure you notify the authorities and the newspaper.
David Markowitz (Power)
John Knowlton (Bean)
P.S. Shaw Taylor constructed the McKeon steps which you just broke.
Hope you like future.
The children included a cutting from the Telegram & Gazette with the editorial office numbers, and Karen Watson was happy to oblige. She called the T&G and also some neighbors, whose names were familiar from the names of the children in the time capsule.
That set phones ringing all over the neighborhood and conjured memories. Many of the parents of those children still live in the homes where they raised them, and remember a little about it.
“I remember when John came home and told me that the McKeons were replacing the steps and they’d buried a time capsule there,” Eileen Knowlton said.
While Mr. Markowitz doesn’t remember the time capsule incident, he admits it’s characteristic.
“It sounds like something I would do,” he said. “I love history, so I probably thought it would be kind of cool.”
The capsule’s finders, the Watsons, did indeed find it cool, for many reasons: Karen Watson was born the year the time capsule was created and finds this snapshot of that time fascinating.
The Watsons have loved the neighborhood, she says, and find this evidence of past residents a link to the history of a place where they’ve been happy. It’s also provided a link to folks still in the neighborhood they didn’t know very well before.
John Knowlton lives nearby but isn’t interested in talking about the find. David Markowitz lives in Manhattan, where he admits he’s passing on his love of the Red Sox to his own children.
The Watsons are interested, though, in making sure their time capsule has a life beyond 34 years. They scanned the items found in the bottle to preserve them, and can email or make a disk of the items for anyone who wants to see them.
They also reburied the items (this time in a plastic bottle) in the new steps that have replaced the 1977 version.
In the bottle is also their own snapshot of the world that their children, Nathanael, Caroline and Samuel, are growing up in: a cutting from the newspaper about the stock market plunge; one about a Red Sox-Twins game; a Sports Illustrated cover about Derek Jeter’s 3,000th home run; a lottery ticket (unscratched); a copy of a Best Buy ad for hand-held computers; a drawing by their 5-year-old; a photograph of their family; and instructions to look them up in the future at the new home they’ll have in Frederick, Md., this fall.
Perhaps someday, their phone may ring with someone asking, “Did you bury a time capsule in 2011?”
“It was pre-Xbox,” Markowitz recalls with amusement. “Kids found things to do.”
In good weather, that amusement was outdoors, riding bicycles or playing at neighbors’ homes. Mr. Markowitz does remember cracking his skull in a childhood accident and needing stitches and spending a lot of time in the McKeon family’s driveway at 63 Paradox Drive, which had a basketball hoop.
The memory of those spring days when a gang of children could roam the neighborhood in what was arguably a safer time may be a blur. But a recent find at the former McKeon family home is bringing some of it back into focus, as new owners Jim and Karen Watson renovated their steps and uncovered a piece of memorabilia from that time, put there by Mr. Markowitz and his friends.
The Watsons most likely viewed the renovation of their front steps as routine as they prepared the home they’ve owned for six years for sale. The concrete required a jackhammer and sledgehammer to remove, and in the process, the contractor uncovered a glass milk jug (remember those?) full of bits and pieces that the Paradox Drive children believed represented their world.
Ellen McKeon, whose name appears in the time capsule along with Dohertys, Elkinds and Edenbergs, says Shay Taylor, who was rebuilding the steps, came up with the idea. The time capsule’s contents reflect the influence of the sports-minded: several Sports Illustrated and Sports Digest covers, and baseball and football cards bearing the names that will bring back memories for many: Johnny Bench, Butch Hobson, Freddy Patek, Luis Gomez, Pat Toomay, Joe Morgan, Bobby Clark and Rick Barry.
The capsule also contained a lottery scratch ticket (bingo, not a winner); several sheets of homework; a bottle of Excedrin; Markowitz’s junior membership card to Trout Unlimited; a parking ticket from Harvard Street (not a surprise to those who have tried to park there); coupons to Whalom Park; a postcard, with postage (6 cents); and a magazine story about hand-held portable televisions.
The names of all the children and young people present that day were recorded on a piece of paper with their names and ages.
Two young men signed a letter found along with the cache, Markowitz and neighbor John Knowlton, were young teens when the time capsule was buried.
Their letter is short and to the point:
To whom it may concern,
Why did you break the steps?
This time capsule was buried April 18, 1977.
Make sure you notify the authorities and the newspaper.
David Markowitz (Power)
John Knowlton (Bean)
P.S. Shaw Taylor constructed the McKeon steps which you just broke.
Hope you like future.
The children included a cutting from the Telegram & Gazette with the editorial office numbers, and Karen Watson was happy to oblige. She called the T&G and also some neighbors, whose names were familiar from the names of the children in the time capsule.
That set phones ringing all over the neighborhood and conjured memories. Many of the parents of those children still live in the homes where they raised them, and remember a little about it.
“I remember when John came home and told me that the McKeons were replacing the steps and they’d buried a time capsule there,” Eileen Knowlton said.
While Mr. Markowitz doesn’t remember the time capsule incident, he admits it’s characteristic.
“It sounds like something I would do,” he said. “I love history, so I probably thought it would be kind of cool.”
The capsule’s finders, the Watsons, did indeed find it cool, for many reasons: Karen Watson was born the year the time capsule was created and finds this snapshot of that time fascinating.
The Watsons have loved the neighborhood, she says, and find this evidence of past residents a link to the history of a place where they’ve been happy. It’s also provided a link to folks still in the neighborhood they didn’t know very well before.
John Knowlton lives nearby but isn’t interested in talking about the find. David Markowitz lives in Manhattan, where he admits he’s passing on his love of the Red Sox to his own children.
The Watsons are interested, though, in making sure their time capsule has a life beyond 34 years. They scanned the items found in the bottle to preserve them, and can email or make a disk of the items for anyone who wants to see them.
They also reburied the items (this time in a plastic bottle) in the new steps that have replaced the 1977 version.
In the bottle is also their own snapshot of the world that their children, Nathanael, Caroline and Samuel, are growing up in: a cutting from the newspaper about the stock market plunge; one about a Red Sox-Twins game; a Sports Illustrated cover about Derek Jeter’s 3,000th home run; a lottery ticket (unscratched); a copy of a Best Buy ad for hand-held computers; a drawing by their 5-year-old; a photograph of their family; and instructions to look them up in the future at the new home they’ll have in Frederick, Md., this fall.
Perhaps someday, their phone may ring with someone asking, “Did you bury a time capsule in 2011?”
posted by Karen @ 7:41 PM
1 Comments:
Oh my goodness, you weren't kidding! What a week!!
The time capsule article is AWESOME! I love it :D I'm glad something fun and positive came out of the week.
and wow about Nate walking! He's growing up so fast!!
(((hugs))) Sorry about Junior. It's so hard to lose a pet, even when you know you did the right thing :(
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