Abraham's Son, Chapter 17

 INT. ABRAHAM'S KITCHEN - NIGHT

Two weeks later, ABRAHAM removes lasagna from oven at same time there is a knock on front door.  He puts lasagna on table, grabs flowers and heads toward front door.

INT. BY FRONT DOOR OF ABRAHAM'S HOUSE - NIGHT

ABRAHAM opens front door.  SARA enters and shows a poker face, no expression.

ABRAHAM:  Here's some flowers for you.

SARA:  Oh, thanks.  They're beautiful...Well, what do you want first, good news or bad news?

ABRAHAM:  Good news.

SARA:  I'm pregnant.  Congratulations, Dad.

They embrace and kiss each other on the cheek.

ABRAHAM:  I couldn't be happier, SARA...What was the bad news?

SARA:  No more fucking.

INT. ABRAHAM'S KITCHEN - NIGHT

ABRAHAM and SARA eat lasagna and discuss the future.

SARA:  The lasagna's good...but, I'm not Italian.  What do I know?

ABRAHAM:  I'm glad you like it, but let's talk about the future.  I'm going to pay for everything.  Have you chosen an OB-GYN yet?  

SARA:  No.

ABRAHAM:  Let me get a recommendation and then we'll make an appointment.  I want to go to all the doctor's visits.  I can pick you up and bring you back.  I want to make this as pain free for you as possible.  

SARA:  Pain free.  Yeah!  

ABRAHAM:  Also, any food supplements, vitamins, whatever the doctor recommends, I'll pay for.  You have to carry the baby, but I want to take care of you...Oh, if and when you decide, you can come here to live.  I have two more bedrooms, one for you and one for the baby.  There'll come a time when you can't work.  Also, I'll want to make sure you're okay and living here will help with that, but it's your decision.

SARA:  You're very kind, ABRAHAM.  We'll work it out together.

_________

Next blog post will be in two weeks on June 4, 2023.

Hyannis

Starting in the early 1980s, when my daughter Rachel was a little girl and my son Bret was yet to be born, my family, numerous times, would go for a week's vacation during the summer to Cape Cod, Massachusetts.  On such visits, we would spend some time in nearby Hyannis which offered many tourist attractions.

President John F. Kennedy put Hyannis on the map as he and his extended family lived in a compound nearby.  We drove by it once.  

I remember dining in restaurants near the water where I would start with a delicious bowl of New England clam chowder.  One time, we took a boat trip to Martha's Vineyard.  Another time, we went to see a baseball game at Fenway Park in Boston.

One rainy day on one of our trips to Hyannis, we stopped at a resort to find out more about a time share.  I was just curious and had no intention of buying one.  

However, a slick saleswoman changed my mind and we bought a time share for a week at the resort in Hyannis.  We spent several weeks there over the years.  When we grew less interested in going to the Cape, we sold our time share at a great loss.  Better to buy at the resale market.  

When my son Bret finished his sophomore year at the University of Maryland (2005), he got a summer job broadcasting baseball games for the Hyannis Mets of the Cape Cod League.  I drove him there from New York and when we arrived the weather had changed drastically from what it had been when we left home.  

It was May, but it seemed as if it was still winter on the Cape.  We went to a store to buy sweat shirts to protect ourselves from the cold weather.  I still have the New England Patriots sweat shirt I bought there.  

Bret spent the summers of both 2005 and 2006 broadcasting baseball games for the Hyannis Mets.  The last game he broadcast there was on my 61st birthday, August 7, 2006, while I was in attendance.         

   

Sabrina

 Sabrina is a 1954 film comedy-drama starring Audrey Hepburn, William Holden and Humphrey Bogart, in a much different role than last month's In a Lonely Place.  The film was written and directed by Billy Wilder.

In the film, Sabrina (Hepburn) is the daughter of a rich family's chauffeur and is in love with David (Holden), the rich family's younger son.  Because of her youth and lack of sophistication, David never pays any attention to Sabrina.  

Distraught that David plans on seducing another woman at their home on Long Island,  Sabrina attempts suicide by turning on all eight cars in the family's garage and closing the doors.  

One bitter cold day when I was an ignorant teenager, I almost did the same thing without knowing what I was doing.  I did not have a key to my family's house, but was able to enter our garage and turn on one of the family's cars to get warm.  I did not know enough to open the garage door.  I could have died from carbon monoxide had not my parents arrived soon after.

In Sabrina's case, she was saved by David's older brother Linus (Bogart) who discovers what she has done.    

Two years later, Sabrina returns from an education in Paris as an attractive and sophisticated young woman.  At first, David does not recognize her, but when he finally realizes who she is, he invites her to his engagement party (to his fourth wife) where he plans on attempting to make love to her.

The marriage to David's fourth wife was arranged by Linus as a sort of business deal.  The two families that would be joined together would form a profitable venture.  As such, Linus wants to prevent David from having a rendezvous with Sabrina and thus sabotaging the engagement and the business deal.

David has the habit of hiding champagne glasses in his back pocket.  Linus forces him to sit down which has the affect of breaking the glasses and putting David out of commission for some days.

While David is recuperating, Linus spends a lot of time with Sabrina hoping to get her to stop thinking of David.  Linus's plan works so well that the two of them forget David and fall in love with each other.  At the end, the two lovebirds take a cruise to France.

One criticism of Sabrina is that Bogart is 30 years older than Hepburn.  Gary Cooper in Love in the Afternoon (1957) is 28 years older than Hepburn.  Cary Grant in Charade (1963) is 25 years older than Hepburn.  That was typical of Hollywood during that era, much older male star opposite a young starlet.        

April 30, 1930

On Wednesday, April 30, 1930 (93 years ago), my parents, Margaret Karch and Harry Lasky wed in Oswego, New York.  Is Wednesday a typical day to get married?  

They honeymooned in Bermuda.  

191 days (27 weeks) after their wedding, on November 7, 1930, my mother delivered a stillborn female child at the Oswego Hospital.  Was it a premature birth?

After graduating from the Oswego Normal School (now the State University of New York at Oswego), my mother signed on to teach for a year in the Niagara Falls, NY school system.  Based on my memory of having seen that contractual agreement, it would have ended in June 1930.  My mother presumably ended the agreement two months early to get married.  Why?

My parents met in 1925 when my mother was eighteen years-old.  My father was twenty-three or twenty-four. 

My parents met when my father was taking room and board at my mother's family's home as he had recently moved to Oswego for work.  My grandparents provided the kosher environment which my father wanted.

My mother confessed to me that she fell in love with my father at first sight, but it took him five years to agree to marry her.  In the mean time, he confessed to me that he dated other women.  

My late brother Ted told me that my mother's sister (Aunt Frances, who died in 2004) told him my mother was pregnant "when she walked down the aisle."  How did she know that?

Neither of my parents ever mentioned the stillborn birth to me. 

What ever is the truth about April 30, 1930, it is important to note that my parents remained happily married for more than fifty-one years until my father's death on September 17, 1981.  They always called each other "sweet."  A good memory of mine.

         

Abraham's Son, Chapter 16

 INT. ABRAHAM'S KITCHEN - DAY

It is next morning and ABRAHAM and SARA eat pancakes and drink coffee.  She wears same clothes she came wearing night before and he is in his pajamas.

SARA:  These pancakes are pretty good...maybe better than Blue Bay.

ABRAHAM:  And you're eating them with real maple syrup, not that fake stuff they have at most places...so, when can you know if you're pregnant?

SARA:  In two weeks, I'll get one of those test kits at the Duane Reade.  Then, I'll know.  I'll be back on Thursday the week after next...for dinner.  Okay?  And you can make your lasagna again.  This time I'll eat it.

ABRAHAM nods his approval.

SARA:  Gotta go.  Thanks for breakfast...and last night was great...glad we did it.  

ABRAHAM:  Me, too.  See you in two weeks.  Take care of yourself.

SARA rises from table, goes to door and leaves.  ABRAHAM remains at table eating.

EXT. IN FRONT OF ABRAHAM'S HOUSE - DAY

As SARA leaves, SANDY arrives at ABRAHAM's house.

SARA:  Good morning.

SANDY:  What?  Who are you?  

SARA:  You must be SANDY.  I'm SARA.  He's told me a lot about you.

SANDY:  Did you sleep with him?

SARA:  Can't tell a lie.

SANDY:  You whore.  I should slap your face.

SARA:  I wouldn't try that.  You'd regret it...A better idea would be to go in and talk to ABRAHAM.  He's got hot pancakes and coffee.

SANDY:  I will do no such thing.  I'm leaving.

SANDY heads back toward her car parked in front of house.

SARA:  If you're gonna leave, then give me a ride to my job.  I waitress at the Blue Bay Diner.  I'll even treat you to breakfast.  And we can talk about your boyfriend.

SANDY listens incredulously.

Pat Summerall

Pat Summerall was born in Lake City, Florida on May 10, 1930.  He played football, basketball, baseball and tennis at his local high school, Columbia.

Summerall attended the University of Arkansas where he played football for three years.  Besides playing tight end on offense and defensive end, he was also the team's place kicker for field goals and extra points.

After being drafted by the Detroit Lions of the National Football League (NFL), Summerall played five years for the Chicago (now Arizona) Cardinals and four years for the New York football Giants.  He was primarily known for his placekicking ability.  Summerall used the straight ahead approach instead of the soccer style which everybody currently uses and has used for many years.

After the 1961 season, Summerall retired from football and moved into a very successful broadcasting career.  He became an analyst for NFL games, a position he held for forty years.  

The highlight of Summerall's football career occurred on December 14, 1958 at Yankee Stadium.  It was the regular season finale against the Cleveland Browns.  The Giants trailed the Eastern Conference's first place Browns by one game and needed a victory to force a one-game playoff to determine who would play the Baltimore (now Indianapolis) Colts in the NFL championship game (pre-Super Bowl).

As the game was winding down, the score was tied at 10-10.  Such a final result (there was no overtime during the regular season) would benefit the Browns.  They would be Eastern Conference champion.  

The Giants were able to edge into Cleveland's territory.  On fourth down, with swirling winds and snow falling, Summerall went out on the field to attempt a 49 yard field goal to give the Giants the win and force a playoff game against the Browns the following Sunday.

Summerall made the kick and became a sports legend.  The Giants beat the Browns the following weekend (10-0), but lost to the Colts in the first NFL championship overtime game two weeks later (23-17).

Pat Summerall died in Dallas, Texas on April 16, 2013 (ten years ago).  

    

JESSI

 In July 1962, I spent two weeks at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York.  It was the summer before my senior year at Oswego High School (OHS).  I was there to participate in the Junior Engineers and Scientists Summer Institute (JESSI).  Perhaps this program was a reaction to Sputnik (1957).  

What was a future accountant doing there with engineers and scientists?  

My parents were filling my head with the point of view that a liberal arts education (like my brother Joel got at Dartmouth College) was wasteful.   Better to invest your time to study something that would lead directly to a job or a career (like my brother Paul did studying civil engineering at Penn).  

Not using my imagination, I decided that I, too, would study engineering at Penn, if I was accepted.

Another benefit of spending two weeks at Clarkson was to experience the freedom of being away from my mother, a preview of what would happen the following year when I would begin my college education.  At almost seventeen years-of-age, I was so ready to leave home.

We were housed in Clarkson dormitories and my roommate was a very likeable sort.  We got along great.  He was also from a small town in New York State.

Monday through Friday, we had introductory classes in various engineering and science courses taught by Clarkson professors.  I remember one such who walked to the blackboard, turning his back to the class, and wrote on it for the entirety of the class.  No communication, eye to eye.  Great teaching technique! 

On the weekend, we could walk into downtown Potsdam and look around.  Not much to see.  A little smaller than Oswego.  

Met a JESSI classmate in town from Rhode Island.  He bragged about his fake ID (no photos then) and his plan to seduce a local girl who would not be able to trace him in case she wanted to (or needed to).  You meet all kinds.  

In the fall, I studied Chemistry at OHS and lost my appetite for engineering.  After I was accepted at Penn, I saw they had a business curriculum and switched to it.  From there I was required to take a year of accounting and the rest of my professional life is history.