Chapter 81: Getting To The Point

July 1, 1981

Breakfast had again been hearty. We sat and talked for a while, then loaded the car. Waving to the Dentons, we pulled out.

“Thanks for indulging me, Helen, and Steve and Angie, too. I don’t see Andrew often enough.”

“I had fun, Sam!” Mom said, chuckling. “Millie is a lot of fun, and I also got some reading done.”

“I did too, Dad! It’s beautiful there. I’d love to visit again,” Angie said.

“Me too,” I added. “It’s peaceful, and there’s plenty to do.”

“Well, thanks, again. It meant a lot to me. And to Andrew.”

“How long until we get there, Dad?” Angie asked.

“Oh, just a couple hours. There’s a diner there that we have to visit for lunch. Then we’ll check in and go visit your grandma.”

“And the other days?”

He laughed. “We’ll visit Timothy and Helen and your cousins tomorrow. On the 3^rd, we’re doing the usual Fourth of July party. Ryan and Colleen will be in. I don’t know if Dwight and Keith, your other cousins, can make it.”

Angie laughed. “I know you’ve said it, but it’s just funny that, out of nine children in my generation, I’m the only girl.”

“Once we had perfection, who needed any more?” I said, laughing, giving her hand a squeeze.

“I think you’re failing out of Brother 101,” Mom laughed. “You’re supposed to say, ‘one too many!’ That’s what my brothers always said. And it’s not just this generation. In mine, there’s me and two boys; Sam had three brothers. And almost all of my cousins, and almost all of Sam’s, were boys too.”

“If that’s the official right answer, then I’ll willingly lose my straight A’s to go with the real right answer.”

Angie gave my hand a squeeze back. “I’m a little nervous, you know. So much family I’ve never met.”

“They’ll love you, honey,” Dad said. “Of course, they will,” Mom added.

I was a bit nervous, right along with Angie. And I thought, despite their positive words, that Dad, and especially Mom, were nervous, too.

We rolled into town in the early afternoon. Stevens Point is a small town by my standards, but I’ve mostly lived in large metro areas. About twenty-three thousand, it’s much larger than the many little farm towns that surround it. It’s the county seat and has a small University of Wisconsin campus. And it’s pretty. I don’t know that I could live there — I’m just not used to anyplace anywhere near that small — but I enjoy visiting. Mostly, anyway.

We headed straight downtown, parked on the square, and walked to a little café that looked like it’d been there forever. It probably had. We went in, Dad asked for a specific booth — fortunately open — and the waitress seated us. Mom and Dad sat next to each other, holding hands.

“Kids, this booth, right here, is where we went on our very first date,” Dad said.

Mom scoffed. “It was not a date! We were just getting lunch because the people you were visiting weren’t in until 2:30.”

“Well, it was the first time I invited you to lunch and the first meal we had together. That counts!”

“We went Dutch. It doesn’t’!”

I grinned. “Somehow it doesn’t surprise me that you don’t agree on this. So, where was your first date, Mom?”

“Um ... well. Here,” she chuckled. “Just not the one your father counts!”

“So, this one’s easy. You’re both right!”

“And let that be a lesson to you kids,” Mom said with a grin. “Your parents are always right, even when they’re wrong.”

Angie and I laughed even more at that.

The waitress came over and smiled. “What’s got you so amused today?”

I jumped in before Dad could get a word out, which was rare. “Our Mom and Dad had their first date here. They can’t agree on when, though.”

She laughed. “Well, whoever’s right, we’re glad you’re back!”

“Oh, they’re both right. It just depends on which meal you count as a date.”

“Oh, it’s that way? Well then, doubly glad! Do you know what you want?”

Dad and Mom nodded. “Of course! The menu hasn’t changed that much.”

Angie and I nodded too. “We can figure it out while they order.”

In the end, all four of us had cheeseburgers with different toppings. Very good cheeseburgers too.

“So, why haven’t I been here before?” I said, as we were finishing.

“You have, you just don’t remember it,” Dad said. “Years ago. Then we got out of the habit of going here because we’d always have lunch with family. This time we’re not meeting for lunch, so we had to come back. Plus, Angie needed to see it.”

“Thanks, Mom and Dad!” Angie said.

After lunch we put our bags in the hotel, then got back in the car. Dad drove us to a quiet street near downtown that I almost remembered and pulled up in front of an old, small, two-story house. “And here’s where I grew up, kids!” she said.

We got out. The door opened and my Grandma Herrmann came out. I knew her name was Beulah, but no one, as long as I can remember, ever called her that. It was ‘Ma’ or ‘Grandma’.

“Ma!” Mom called, ran up, and hugged her.

“Helen, honey! It’s so good to see you!”

Dad walked over. “Sam! It’s good to see you, too.”

I walked over with an obviously nervous Angie. “Hello, Steve! And this must be the Angie I’ve heard so much about! How lovely you are! Come in, come in!”

She led the way, ushering us into the living room. As always, my first impression of the house was that it was small. Small living room, small kitchen, tiny bedrooms. I’m sure by the standards when it was built it was just fine, but I couldn’t quite wrap my head around what living here had been like. Probably warm and homey, I had to admit. But I couldn’t see it, all the same. Of course, our house in Houston, which I thought of as reasonably spacious but cozy, was far smaller than the houses people were building on the same street in the 2000s. Tastes change.

“Sit, sit! I’ll bring you some tea!”

“I’ll help you, Ma.”

Mom and Grandma brought out glasses of iced tea and we all sat down. “Now, how have you all been?”

“Very well, Ma.”

“Yes, we have. I’m sorry I couldn’t bring Helen up here last summer.”

“Nonsense! You had much too much to do!”

“I’ve been well, Grandma, thanks. School is going well, and, really, everything.”

“I’m glad to hear that, Steve. Now, the most important guest — my new granddaughter! My first granddaughter! It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Angie. How are you?”

Angie blushed. “I’m doing, um ... really well, um...”

“Just call me Grandma, dear.”

“I’m doing really well, Grandma.”

“I’m happy to hear that. It’s tragic what happened to you, just tragic. But I hear from Helen that you’ve hung in there and are much better.”

Angie picked up a little steam. “I am. It’s, um ... well. The way I put it is that I wish Daddy Frank was alive. I love him, always will, and I miss him. But I love Mom and Dad and Steve so much, too, and I can’t imagine not being a family together, now. Which gives me lots of family I don’t know. Like you, Grandma. And I’m happy to get to meet you!”

“Thank you, honey. That’s so sweet. When Helen called to tell me they were adopting another child, I just couldn’t believe it! But, of course, the circumstances were so different, and I was just happy you’d have a loving home.”

“Me, too! And it’s been much more than I even dreamed of.”

“That’s wonderful. And school is going well?”

“Yes! Steve and I are both straight A students and study together and have mostly the same friends. I worried about starting at a new school, but it hasn’t been a problem at all.”

“You two seem to get along well. Helen always was very close with her brothers. Until they figured out she was a girl, anyway!”

Mom laughed. “Well, I always was a tomboy. But they knew I was a girl!”

“I’m not sure even you knew that until after you met Sam.” Mom blushed, Dad smiled. “Then you two spent forever refusing to date. I thought I was going to have to get forceful with both of you!”

Mom laughed at that, still blushing. “I was not that bad!”

“Well, maybe not, but it seemed like it sometimes. Do you remember when...”?

We said our goodbyes and headed out to the car about six.

“Well, that was embarrassing!” Mom said with a sigh and a bit of a giggle. None of Grandma’s stories had been anything all that bad. Nor had they answered any of the questions we had, based on the little hints she’d dropped and her little evasions. But they reinforced the notion that Mom had gotten up to plenty of mischief when she was a teenager.

“It always is,” Dad agreed, chuckling. “But it’s always fun visiting with her.”

“She lets out more of her irreverent side now that Daddy’s gone. I miss him, always will, but it’s fun seeing that side of her.”

“And I see where you get it from!”

“Oh, Sam!”

Heading back to the hotel, Angie and I watched the town. After just a few blocks, Mom pointed. “That’s the church we went to. Well, Ma and Tim and Helen and the boys still do. And, see, there’s the grocery I always got sent to when we needed something. And my first job was waitressing ... there! See! Oh my goodness, it’s a Radio Shack now!”