I like writing stories for this blog, but sometimes, I’m stumped as to what to write about. Whenever that happens, I go to the hall closet and pull out the old photographs to peruse, because I always find something there! And, then I write about a thousand words. So here goes!  Today’s photo was taken on July 4, 1980.

Cindy, Pam, Bonnie, Linda, Dennis

  It’s a photo of me and my siblings, sitting from right to left in our birth order. Since I’m the youngest I am on the left wearing my ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) tee-shirt.

And, since I brought up the tee-shirt, I guess I’ll start this story with it. I got the ELO tee-shirt from my friend, Tina, who went to ELO’s famous “Big Night” concert tour in Pittsburgh in 1978 without me. I had wanted to go, and can’t remember now why I could not go, but Tina bought me a tee-shirt that I absolutely loved and that I only ever wore on special occasions.

Me, Pam, Bonnie, Linda and Dennis are sitting on the picnic table in my parents’ yard at their stone house. It was the 4^th of July, which meant my parents were having a family picnic. In 1980, all five of us kids were married, and four of us had kids of our own, too. So, by then the picnics were not the same as when we were younger and all living at home.

But, back in the day, aunts, uncles, two grandmas and cousins from both mom and dad’s side of the families would come for the family picnic.  Us kids would play badminton or jarts (a game using huge darts with these dangerously long sharp points that you would throw and try to stick in a ring, that essentially would kill you or at least put your eye out if you were unluckily standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, or were in the path of an errant toss) or dodge ball or go gallivanting out in the woods at Devil’s Canyon (rock formations) and play hide and seek after it got dark. We also got to light sparklers after dark. Picture a handful of kids running around in the dark with an eight inch wand of pyrotechnic fuel reaching about 3000 degrees Farenheit in each hand! The men would drink beer, play horseshoes, then usually switch to poker after it got dark.  The women would set up all the eats, clean up all the messes, and finally retreat to the kitchen to chat (and laugh hysterically) about adult stuff after it got dark.

I remember one year my Uncle Bobby from the big city of Pittsburgh, knowledgeable in all big city things, spiked a watermelon with rum.

And, I remember snow flurries one year during the annual summer picnic, unusual even for Pennsylvanians.

So, back to the photo. I was 22 years old in 1980. And, I was married and already a mom, too.  Our cousins were grown with their own families and not too interested in our family 4^th of July picnics anymore.  But, because of the photo, I can see that in 1980 all of us siblings were there together. I think Brian and I might have lived on a farm in a nearby community at the time. Pam and her husband Gary would be moving to Colorado soon. Bonnie and her husband lived just a few miles down the road. Linda was not too far away, living in Pittsburgh with her husband. I’m not sure where my brother Dennis was in his life in 1980.  He might have been living with his family in the old hometown, or home from Texas for a visit.  

There we all were, grown siblings with a long history of 4^th of July gatherings posing for a picture for our mother on July 4, 1980.  My nephew, Dennis Jr, was 13. His sister, Lori was 11. My daughter Carrie was not quite four years old.  Her cousin, Shani was also three years old. Jason would be turning three in another month or so and Kara had recently celebrated her first birthday. My other nieces, Kelly and Shannon were not born yet.

We probably had hot dogs and hamburgers and pickled eggs, and potato salad, maybe some ham salad, corn on the cob and watermelon for this picnic fete.  My dad would have had the horse shoe pit set up. He and his son and the sons-in-law might have played some poker after it got dark. My sisters and I would have been sitting around the kitchen with our mom chatting (and laughing hysterically) after dark.

This picture was taken on the same day on the same picnic table. Cindy, Brian and Carrie.