On the positive side, over in USA, Cade was now up and about and would be celebrating his second birthday in August:
We would be meeting up with the Lesinas again in the summer but the logistics of our trip had to be sorted out first of all. We liked to go to different places, and, in those days, we used what was then my boss' Florida timeshare and exchanged it through Interval International. What came up that year was a resort in Branson, Missouri - a place that we didn't know much about, but it then advertised itself as the "entertainment capital of USA". Certainly, there's plenty of theatres/theaters and shows there, but Las Vegas it's not.
Our big flight that year would take us in to Chicago and we would spend a couple of nights there before heading south to Missouri. Once everything was booked, prior to leaving, we bumped in to John and Jayne Taylor, who were on a visit back to Banchory, having moved away down south a few years previously. We told them about our plans to visit Branson and discovered that they had been there a few years before. John's immediate comment was that we were way too young to go there!
The timing of our holidays in those days when we were both working full-time was determined largely by the school holidays, which thankfully coincided with a summer shutdown period at the canning factory where I spent most of my working time. Kelly was 23 but still living in relative poverty and the chance of another free holiday in USA was too much to turn down - even if it was with her middle-aged parents - and she got to spend some time with her sister again and see how her little nephew was growing up.
We got to our hotel in Chicago city centre in good time. It was early evening Friday and all the office workers were out celebrating the end of the working week. Across the road from our hotel there was a brewpub with a rooftop terrace so we hot-footed it over there:
We were in the home of electric blues and I was determined to visit one of the clubs, and Buddy Guy's Blues Club wasn't too far away:
We had something to eat and listened to the music for a while, but soon our body clocks took over and told us to get some sleep - quickly!
Suitably refreshed, we determined to "do" the Windy City on Saturday and this involved Lake Michigan shorefront, an architectural cruise through the city, a trip to the top of Sears Tower and, to round the afternoon off, we took in the Rockin' Rib Fest:
It was hot and I didn't have a hat - hence the makeshift bandana. Little Steven (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Van_Zandt), I'm not:
After watching the sunset from the top of Sears Tower, it was time to tick off another brewpub - Goose Island this time:
Next stop Branson, Missouri - another new state to tick off. The Taylors were right - Branson is for very old people - and we weren't quite that yet. The outstanding memory of that week was when we went to see The Platters - one of many who parade under that banner:
The town is full of pensioners - many of them war veterans. Before the show started, everyone was upstanding to sing the Stars & Stripes, with hands on hearts. We hadn't expected this and didn't quite know how to react. In the end, we stood up with the rest of them, but we didn't sing along - we couldn't anyway. It was at that moment that we realised Branson wasn't quite the place we thought it might be when we booked it.
It wasn't all bad, however - far from it. We visited Silver Dollar City, where Kelly and I - but not Jo - did the rides there - Wild Woody go-karts, Wildfire roller coaster and the American Plunge water slide:
We also took a boat out on Table Rock Lake and visited the local canyons. I managed a game of golf at Thousand Hills GC, where I played with Bruce, a Hawaiian on vacation. We had to take in at least one more show, however and we chose a Neil Diamond tribute - it was awful. On the way home one night, we spotted Andy Williams' Moon River theatre/theater:
All in all, it wasn't a bad week in the end - an experience, all part of life's rich tapestry. It was time to head west now to meet up with Lucy, Scott and Cade - and also my friend Syd Freeman, who would be staying with us for a while.
Syd and I played some golf when he was in Oregon, but we also did a bit of the tourist thing, including a visit to the Oregon Vortex/House of Mystery:
In those days, Jo, Kelly and I slept in the house, as Cade was only small, but Syd slept in the trailer - the old one, which didn't have AC! When we went out in the evening, rather than take two cars, we all got in to Scott's truck, but there wasn't enough room in the cabin for Syd, so he had to rough it in the back of the pick-up:
Does he look hard done by? I think so - but he had a case.
It was one of the smoky years. Most days, we could not see the sun for the smoke coming from the huge forest fires of California and Oregon, although it was still pretty warm - a steady 96 F, I seem to recall. There were occasional periods of sunshine however and we took a few trips to local wineries and also to pretty Jacksonville:
Cade's second birthday was the highlight - he enjoyed demolishing the penyatta:
We enjoyed the (rectangular) pool, as it was in those days:
Then it was time to leave, so it was time for a family photo - the first in a line that is still going to this day - although not quite from the same position:
We weren't long back when I got the call from Barry that we had been dreading. It was a Monday morning. Mum had gone downhill and Barry told me I should get down there. Jo and I got ourselves organised and let everyone know where we were going then set off down the road. Driving between Dundee and Perth, Barry called again and told me we were too late. I was shaken - I didn't imagine it would have happened that quickly. I stopped the car for a minute. Jo offered to drive, but I said I would carry on.
We spent a bit of time at Mum's bedside. I said a few words to her. It reminded me of the year when Mum had her fall at Foxbar Drive, precipitating subsequent events. It was again when we had just returned from USA. Mum was in hospital and they were waiting for the coagulant that neutralises the effects of Warfarin to kick in, so they could relieve the pressure on her brain caused by the haemorrhage. She was conscious but not really with it and I started telling her stories of what we had done on holiday. There wasn't much reaction from her but I kept talking anyway to help to keep her awake until the drugs kicked in and the medics could take further action.
I deeply regret not being there when Mum actually passed - we could have left Banchory a bit earlier than we did, but I imagined we were going to be down there for her last few days, and it turned in to just hours.
I'm always told I'm more of a Barr than a Stewart and it's true I did spend a lot of time with Mum - especially in our days in Corby before Barry and Dawn came along and when they were still young. I always remember coming home from school during Wimbledon fortnight and watching the tennis with her - but I've chronicled these days in early postings to this blog. When we moved back to Scotland, Dad was away quite a lot with his job with Beanstalk (whatever happened to them?) and again I would spend time with Mum, joining in with whatever she was doing, be it watching TV, knitting, crocheting or cooking - not that I actually cooked anything, but I was a useful "hoover", especially when she was baking - I loved licking the bowl clean. I can still see that bowl to this day - it was kind of creamy/magnolia coloured and it had a criss-cross pattern on the outside.
I miss her - but I guess probably not half as much as Dad did, as evidenced by this note he wrote at the time, which was in his possession when he passed several years later:
I still can't read this without crying.
Moving in to winter, I was a fairly regular attender at the golf club's annual prizegiving, regularly picking up trophies - and this year was no exception:
Perhaps Dick Taylor and I celebrated a little too much?
Come Christmas, it was our 30th anniversary and we decided to celebrate it by heading off to Mallorca for a short break over the holiday period, stopping first of all in London. We stayed at the Marriott County Hall, formerly the home of the GLC, where Ken Livingstone was briefly "king". The hotel was lovely and what a great location - the London Eye was just outside and the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben were just across the river:
Next stop was Mallorca. We stayed at the Marriott resort, Son Antem, which wasn't far from the city of Palma and its huge cathedral:
We also took a trip back to Palmanova, where we had been on on October "tattie holiday" break back in 1984. We stopped outside the hotel we had stayed at back then, where there had been building work going on, which had disrupted our holiday a bit:
So that was 2002.
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