We attended Ronald’s ninety-second birthday party last year on Easter. It was the first time we met my wife’s relatives in Ohio in person. Read about it here.

We had dinner Friday night with Lori’s cousin, Jennifer. I was a third wheel as they caught up on the past year’s happenings with her family in Ohio and our’s in Maryland. How comfortable they are with each other amazed me.

Dinner finished, they went shopping, leaving me to fend for myself. Fortunately, there was a Half-Price Books store in the mall. I perused the stacks to kill time. After a suitable length of time, I paid for the one book I found interesting and went to rescue my wallet. My surprise, they were finishing, and my wallet wasn’t empty.

We thought we arrived early for the party only to find almost everyone already there. Missing was Heather and Heather. One is my wife’s sister and the other a cousin. They came in minutes after us, so we weren’t the last.

Everyone doted on Ronald, the guest of honor, all afternoon. His smile lit up the room when his children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and family from Texas and Maryland sang and wished him a happy birthday. The great-great-grandchildren could not attend. Later, he joined in singing some Scottish ditties to our delight.

The day’s excitement tired Ronald and about 7:30 it was time for him to rest. We said goodnight and goodbye to Ronald as Jennifer and Heather took him to his room.

Cousin Heather invited us and my wife’s sister Heather to her house. We spent several hours visiting before having to call it a night to rest for the drive home.

I may have mentioned it rained on the drive home. It rained, it poured, it drizzled, and it rained seven hours of the eight we drove. It couldn’t dampen () our good feelings about the weekend.

We had a great time and looked forward to the next visit.

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