Your Ability to Find the Silly in The Serious Will Take You Far

The title of this post is a fortune from a Chinese fortune cookie I ate a few weeks ago that I kept in my wallet. I thought about it today as we all sat around my grandmother's dining room table while she laid down on the couch and told us stories about the trials and tribulations of raising four big, boisterous, and opinionated boys. I thought about it yesterday when my uncle Larry walked into the dining room after spending hours going through his brother Jimmy's very cluttered house with my father and complained "Jimmy had only two feet, but 60 pairs of shoes."
My uncle Jimmy had only two feet. Not has. I'm still having a hard time talking about him in the past tense. The last time I saw him over a week ago in the hospital before his surgery he was drifting off to sleep. As I walked in alone he said "Hey kiddo!" I sat with him for a few hours before returning to Highland Park to work on some packing. Oddly enough, I thought a lot over the next week a lot about how alike we were and how grateful I was to have him around. We were both the oldest in our families, and shared a lot of the qualities that come along with that. High-achieving, responsible, pragmatic, detail-oriented, etc. While he was known to join his brothers in whatever topic they were shouting about (politics, sports, money, but usually politics) many times he was a voice of calm and reason. Family get-togethers are not going to be the same without him.


May the road rise up to meet you,
May the wind be ever at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields,
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.

For Boston, For Boston, We Sing Our Proud Refrain

There are a ton of songs about Boston, so be prepared for me to reference them here as often as possible in a most corny fashion. The title to this blog is from the song "For Boston" by Dropkick Murphys (who else, really). I can't wait until I can see them play in their native city.
Speaking of their native city, I'm moving there in FIVE days! It's absolute insanity. I've never lived farther than an hour or 2 from home, let alone out of the state, so this is going to be a HUGE change. The point of this blog is for me to chronicle some of my adventures, keep you all abreast of what's shaking in my life, and encourage you to let me know what's going on in yours. Needless to say, I'm going to miss so many people so very very much, that I think it's best for me to focus on the positive:

I'M MOVING TO BOSTON!!!!!!!!

Ok, that's over. For now. If I see you over the next few days I can't promise you won't hear that in person.

I had a most amazing last-weekend-in-Jersey, I have to say. I spent Friday evening having dinner with my Steph ('anie!' as her mom would make sure to add). I'm going to miss that girl like crazy! She's one of a select group of people I credit my sanity to. I had to bolt early to try to avoid crazy parkway traffic and get a head start on some packing, which proved futile, because everyone in Ocean County forgot how to drive on Friday. I was in traffic for an hour due to an accident that was already mostly cleaned up. Whoops! Saturday I did some packing/cleaning and had a hugely adventurous night. I spent about four hours at the Fontainbleu Diner with the members of my Henderson family still residing in NJ. It was so great to spend lots of time with all of them. We were cracking up the whole night, and I loved every bit of it. After that, we made a midnight run to Dunkin Donuts, which I found out is where all the high schoolers in Highland Park hang out on the weekend. Fun times. I got home around 12:30 and found out (due to my increasingly worrisome Facebook/Twitter habit) that the lead singer of one of my favorite bands was about to go on at the Court Tavern. They didn't advertise the show, but every once in a while the lead singer of the Gaslight Anthem does solo acoustic shows at this little bar in New Brunswick. I got there at about 1:30am- in time to catch the last 3 songs. The crowd was filled with very drunk very enthusiastic Gaslight Anthem fans, and I was thrilled to be there and hang out with some Manor boys. Today I just procrastinated and then packed some more. All in all, a great weekend.

I'm starting my very last week with Amachi tomorrow, and it's getting late even for me. Goodnight, sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite :)