The beach played a big part in our family
life. It was only an hour's drive and
free, so we spent many weekends body surfing, picnicking, and playing
foxes and geese. This snapshot suggests
that my enduring love for the ocean was formed before I could walk.
When we weren't at the beach we were
usually involved in the arts
in a lowbrow sort of way. All of us at one time or another participated in local
or school theater, but music was the one art we all did together
with equal enthusiasm. Both Mom and Dad
had gorgeous voices and a deep appreciation for most types of music. None of us kids inherited our
parents' talent, but what we lacked in quality we made up for in
gusto. We sang in the car, around the piano, at the dinner table and at
parties.
Daddy had no musical training but his natural gifts were prodigious and
supplied endless family entertainment. He sang bass in a barbershop quartet and
played a homegrown honky tonk on our piano. He patiently taught me simple melodies so we could play mean duets of a sort--me plunking with one finger
and him with at least twenty five fingers banging on the other eighty seven
keys.
But my fondest memory is of the ballroom dances
my folks learned and happily practiced with us at home.
As much as I later loved to do the twist and
the bump, bopping to the Beach Boys never held a candle to waltzing with
my father.
