This Easter we spent a week with my parents in Indiana. Knowing that they will soon be seriously downsizing before moving to assisted living, I was flooded with memories every time I noticed another detail or artifact. I took a few pictures, of interest only to my family. Paul and Frank were able to join us. The home is impeccably clean (as home always seemed to be--those Swiss Mennonite genes), utterly orderly and well-appointed. When the unit was being built, the folks had the western wall designed so that it admits far more light than is available in other units, and that additional sunshine has been wonderfully satisfying for the past two decades of their lives, on dark days and sunny. Dad had been an ordained Mennonite minister in Ohio before becoming an administrator at the college. Looking around, one quickly discerns the importance of religion to these octogenarians.
My thanks to Amy for removing a pesky chandelier from the Easter dinner picture. What magic! My two absent brothers generously contributed the sugar-cured ham to the dinner.
