The Lake

A few weeks ago my cousin Jodi devoted her blog to the lake. Jodi was lucky enough to live near my grandparents while growing up, and has been able to spend much more time at the lake than I have.   We try to get there for at least a few days out of the summer.  Even so, we have some very special memories.

Our family vacations have been filled with the loving arms of my grandparents. They are a shining example of how to have a long and healthy marriage. They have lots of wisdom and stories to share. The lake is what it is because of them, because of what they have built, together, over 62 years. 

Our family vacations at the lake have also been filled with boat rides, tubing, swimming, attempts at fishing, sunburns, laughter, stories of our infamous lake monster, sunrises on the deck, sunsets on the deck, conversation, and lots of family (sometimes lots and lots of family when we have our reunions). To me, there is no place on earth like the lake. I bet Nick can't think of a summer without the lake.  Jack is building memories now that will no doubt last a lifetime. The other day when Jack was in the water he said: "I love my dad because he gets me surprises.  I love my mom because she has lots of grandparents."  LOL (He has five on my side, and two on Bernie's side).

 

 

In August of 2002, Bernie and I picked out my engagement ring before we left for Georgia.  The salesperson said it would be ready in about three weeks.  Bernie had them rush the order.  He picked up the ring and stored it in his backpack.  When we got to the hotel on the first night of our drive, Bernie read me the riot act as I went to pull the toothpaste out of his bag.  I was confused. I didn't know what he has hiding. He was afraid I would find the ring.  One afternoon after we got to the lake, Nick, Bernie and I went out on the pontoon boat.  We anchored in the middle of the water to go for a swim.  Instead, Bernie got down on one knee and proposed.  I was completely surprised!  Of course, I said yes.  Nick thought we were married right then and there.  He had no idea about the wedding planning that was to follow.  My grandparents were thrilled.  My Aunt Kelly said, "finally!" Bernie had told her earlier in the week and showed her the ring.  She was having a hard time keeping it a secret.  Bernie says he proposed on the boat so that he could throw me overboard if I said no.  He was also planning on bringing a fake ring so that he could pretend he dropped it in the lake.  He intentionally fumbled with my ring, just to make me nervous.

 

Our 10th anniversary was this year.  We learned of our loved one being sick on the eve of our anniversary and just didn't feel like celebrating.  There were obviously more important things going on and I figured we would just have a bigger celebration on a non-milestone year (11, 12, etc.).   I never gave it a second thought.

 

Until the other night.... Bernie had a surprise for me.  I had been joking about how it wasn't fair that Jack gets all the surprises. He had wanted to give it to me on the Pontoon boat, but the boat is out of commission.  He had wanted to give it to me outside, but it barely stopped raining.  With all that, he decided to give it to me on the dock.  I was putting Vivi to bed and she wouldn't go to sleep.  Eventually she did.  He brought the champagne from home that he bought for our anniversary but we hadn't opened. There had been a break in the rain, and the lake was quiet.  The moon was dancing on the water.  It was like we were the only two people in the world, alone, on our own island.  There are some moments in life that you want to last forever.  This was one of them. 

 

The traditional tenth anniversary gifts are aluminum and tin.  The modern gift is diamond jewelry.  Bernie had decided to cover all the bases.  He picked out a beautiful diamond necklace with matching earrings, he put them in a heart shaped tin box that he had engraved, and surrounded them with Hershey kisses which are of course wrapped in tin foil.  The jewelry is gorgeous.  I was completely surprised and overwhelmed that he had done all this.  I am one lucky girl.

 

 

Speaking of wedding anniversaries, Happy 42nd Anniversary today to Bernie's parents, Barbara and John.  Congratulations! Plan on celebrating at some point in the next week or so with us and with Chesapeake Bay blue crabs and lemon meringue pie. 

 

Tonight's quote is what my husband engraved on that heart shaped box:

 

Love does not consist in gazing at each other,

but in looking outward in the same direction.

- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

 

So true.

 

Under the quote, he engraved: May I have this Dance; which is also what is engraved on my wedding band. 

The Roast of Bernie Edwards

I have been holding off on blogging because I wanted to post about Bernie’s roast with a link to the video and pictures of all the roasters.  I give up.  We are missing a wire to the video camera required to hook it up to the computer.  I am sure it is in my house somewhere.  I tried to get a replacement at Radio Shack and it was a no-go.  They told me to contact Panasonic which I just haven’t had time to do.  The other issue is that the video isn’t wouldn’t exactly carry a PG rating and I don’t want to offend anyone.  If I ever get it up on Youtube, I might just email it to the people that I know would be interested.  Also, I’ve got lots of pictures of roasters, but sadly none of my Dad since he was the unofficial/official photographer. 

I obviously knew Bernie’s 40^th birthday was approaching.  I asked him numerous times what he wanted to do and didn’t get much of a response.  A few weeks before his birthday, I made an executive decision and booked a trip to New Orleans for the fall, a trip to which we are very much looking forward.  About 10 days before his birthday, we attended his buddy Chris’ 40^th birthday bash.  It was that night, after a few beers that Bernie said he wanted, not a party, but a roast.  There was no way on earth I was going to be able to put that together in 10 days.  I at least figured out the details so that I could give him the invitation on his birthday.  This was the invitation:

Since he knew about the party, we kept the roasters top secret.  Bernie was good about this until a week before the party.  Not knowing was killing him and he kept pestering Nick and I for the information.  As far as I know the only person that got leaked was his brother, Gary; and I think that leak was by Gary himself.

 I wanted to do favors for everyone.  I had really wanted to get a caricature of Bernie done and post it everywhere at the party and put in on candy bar wrappers.  I didn’t have time to put that together.  Gary and his girlfriend Katie came to the rescue.  Katie found out that you could print m&ms not just with sayings but with pictures.  Gary found two pictures of Bernie, one recent and one from his teenage years.  The m&ms featured a picture of Bernie on one side, and either “Bern’s Roast” or “40 bites” on the other side.  They were perfect!

 
I browsed through Pinterest to find the perfect cake.  When I found it, I knew there was no way I could make it myself.  Our friend Debbi graciously agreed to bake the cake (she also made our wedding cake and many other cakes for important events).  Here is a picture of the very yummy cake:

Jeremy worked with Bernie in his early days at Nabisco (around the time Nick was born). Jeremy was the host of the roast.  He did a fantastic job as I knew he would. I had him in mind from the very beginning.  When I asked him, he said “I’ve been waiting for this my whole life.”   My husband hates having his picture taken.  He tries to ruin my pictures by sticking his middle finger up in a lot of them.  I have so many of these pictures that I think Bernie may have to tell his grandchildren that he had some sort of disorder that made him do this.  Jeremy took a bunch of these pictures and made a slide show, i.e. children’s book entitled, the “Meet Bernie Edwards.”  Whether Bernie is sad, happy, mad, etc., there is a middle finger picture for every occasion.  Jeremy says there are other books in the series, but I don’t want to give too much away in case you actually do get to see the video.

 

Bernie is very sensitive about his hair.  So much so, I really tried to get our hairdresser to roast him.  Unfortunately she was not available.  Gary was the next roaster and had the most access to younger pictures of Bernie.  Gary did a slide show of the phases of Bernie’s hair showing how it had changed over the years.  For a long time, Bernie cut his own hair (and sometimes not very well).  Gary even had a picture of when Bernie tried to cut Gary’s hair.  It was so funny to see all those pictures, and I’m so thankful that we have Sue to cut his hair now.

Kellee was next on the list.  She talked about how Bernie often wears his emotions on his sleeve and how she could tell the next morning whether he had won or lost a tennis match the night before.  Knowing he is a die hard Yankees fan, he would often dress our children in Yankee outfits only to find Red Sox patches over the logos when Bernie picked them up at the end of the day. She wore Bernie’s Reggie Jackson Jersey (favorite player, favorite jersey), over a Red Sox shirt.  Bernie was beside himself when she took it off and stepped on it.  I think she was the surprise presenter, Bernie wasn’t expecting her to roast him.
 

 Chris was the next roaster.  He went to high school with Bernie and Bernie introduced Chris to his wife, Jacinta.  Chris had a lot of great stories.  One of them was when he was on his first date with Jacinta and Bernie had come along.  Chris stopped to get gas and wanted to impress Jacinta, so he pulled the dipstick out of the car to check the oil.  After he did so, he couldn’t remember where to put it back.  Neither could Bernie.  Jacinta was the only one who could figure it out.  Hold this thought for a blog post coming soon…

 

My Dad went next.  The only problem is that my Dad didn’t realize he was on the list.  I thought we had adequately communicated over text message, but I guess not.  Nonetheless, my Dad did a great job.  He recounted the story of how Bernie is known as “the Drunk Guy” in Lockport, NY.  Once again, I don’t want to give away too much in case you get to see the video.

Nick was the last official roaster.  He had been nervous and had settled on toasting, rather than roasting his dad. That was until Bernie wouldn’t stop bugging him about what he was going to say.  Nick wrote his speech the night before and would run parts of it by me.  Everytime I gave him an idea of what to write, Nick would come up with five other things.  Nick knows more about us than probably anyone else.  He did a great job.  He really stole the show.

 

After Nick, I toasted Bernie and then many people got up and took the opportunity to get a roast or a toast in: my mom, Carolyn, Jason, Bridgette, Arleen and Reggie to name a few. Then Bernie got to give his rebuttal.

I think everyone at the party had a really good time.  The wait staff said it was the best party they had ever worked.  A few times I saw the bar tender crying he was laughing so hard.  You know it was a good roast if people who didn’t know Bernie thought it was hilarious.  I have to give a shout out Margaritas in Mystic. We moved a lot of furniture, we hung a tablecloth from the bar to use as a projection screen, the food was very good and they were very easy to work with.  If you are ever throwing a party, you should consider Margaritas.  They were very accommodating!

I was blown away by the amount of time that people spent preparing for the roast.  Every presentation was awesome. It was also really good to see people that we haven’t connected with in a long time.  It is so easy to lose touch when there is so much going on. We are truly blessed by the friends and family who are part of our lives.

Thank you to everyone who came, for all the presentations, for all of the generous gifts, to Debbi for making the cake, to my Dad and Arleen for lugging the PA system from Buffalo and for all your help setting up, to Chris for letting us borrow the projector, and to Adam and Jen (parents of Jack’s friend, Caroline) for taking such great care of Jack and Vivian during the party. I definitely could not have pulled it off without all of you.

 

"A friend is one who knows you

and loves you just the same."

- Elbert Hubbard