EATING OUT......FEBRUARY 13 2012........



Left to right Friends Brenda, Vicki, Kay and me on our Hawaii cruise

 I get to eat out tonight!  Outback Steak House no less.  So, what brought this on?

My errand today is to pick up son Jerry at the Ford dealership, where he has to drop off his car after work for inspection or some such thing.  It is my job to pick him up there, then tomorrow night after supper take him back up to retrieve his car.  (He has another vehicle he will drive to work tomorrow - I don't have to take him and pick him up).

So tonight I get to eat out.

I am sure you are wondering what is so special about that.  It IS SPECIAL to me, and always has been.  You see, eating out is not something I grew up with.

When I was growing up I had never even heard the phrase "eating out", much less knowing what it was.  We ate at home.  Sometimes at my Aunt and Uncles, the ones in our home town, sometimes at my Grandmothers, but we ate at home.  If we did eat at one of the relatives homes we walked.  We had no car.  Never had a car until I graduated from H.S. went to work and bought a used Ford.

It wasn't until I reached 9 years of age that I found out what "eating out" was all about.  It was at that age that, for the first time ever, I got to go to Cleveland to visit my Aunt Pat.  She and Uncle Cas lived and worked there.

My mother, in a taxi, took me to Bridgeport Ohio to catch the 6 a.m. milk train run to Cleveland, which took 6 hours.  I was left in the coach car and the conductor agreed to look after me. 

Can you imagine what would happen today?  My Mother would be arrested and put in jail for "child abandonment" or some such thing. 

When arriving in Cleveland Aunt Pat was at the train terminal waiting for me.  And I discovered a whole new world! 

We ate out almost every night of the week that I spent with her.  She introduced me to restaurants, museums, zoos, amusement parks, circuses, and even some travel.

We ate at a cafeteria, a White Castle hamburger joint - no such things as fast food and McDonalds back then - Italian restaurants with candles and red and white checked tablecloths, Chinese complete with chop sticks, something different every night. 

We went shopping, for just stuff, not necessities only, as at home.  At the end of the week she packed up a box that would be shipped to me at home.  Then back to the train station to board the train (she also would have been arrested and put in jail), arriving back at Bridgeport late at night, where Mother and her trusty taxi would be waiting for me.

Each summer there-after, until I was about 15 (it was then they retired and moved to the country and my Sister and I spent part of the summer with them there) I had that one week of wonderment, of learning, of doing, visiting the magic kingdom of Cleveland, Ohio.  It wasn't just me, my sister got to have her week also when she reached 9 years of age, and as we got a little older, we would go together.

So even to this day, "eating out" is still something special.  It brings back the happy memories of child-hood, of something special, the Magic Kingdom.

I hope you all have some great memories as I do.  It is what keeps us going.  So enjoy the sunshine and God Bless.