Note-icing

My mom’s Aunt Jean, who never married, lived with her sister Jessie and brother-in-law Jack, my grandparents. She helped raise my mom and her siblings … and she likewise was a constant presence in my childhood.

Great Aunt Jean was a phenomenal knitter, known to be able to knit and nap at the same time. My all-time favorite of hers was a blue sweater she knitted for my brother that featured a white angora bunny. It tickles my nose just to think of it.

She and my grandparents lived at 63 Shellbank Place in Rockville Centre …

about half an hour drive from my childhood home in Mineola. We visited often and I have fond memories of doing projects with my Pop Pop and baking with my Grandma and Aunt Jean.

My mom and dad (who met on a blind date) used to say that Aunt Jean would look out her window overlooking the front walk when they came home from the movies or rendezvous at the Wonder Bar.

Dad was drafted by the army and posted overseas in France, after which he and Mom married and had their wedding reception on the wrap-around front porch at Shellbank Place.

I loved running on that porch, not to mention rolling down the “hill” in the front yard. But my favorite spot in the house was the front parlor, which had an upright piano, a miniature pipe organ (which didn’t work), and a tv (which did work and was the main attraction as we didn’t have one at our house until I was school age).

I still have the desk from that front parlor, a wedding gift from Pop Pop to Grandma …

As it did when I was little, it holds puzzles, toys and games for visiting grandchildren. Sadly, the scent of tobacco that also was kept in the desk is long gone.

All this by way of saying I also have a sweet ceramic jar that used to be in Aunt Jean’s room, complete with a post-it note written by my mom, who gifted it to me many years ago …

• 

• 

It does indeed have a place on my bookshelf …

and yep, it always looked like a face to me, too.

Process photos:

• 

•