Second Annual Lobster Festival, Murrieta, CA

First Annual Lobster Festival, 2015

Sunday, October 7-9, 2016, marked the Second Annual Lobster Festival in Murrieta, California. It was a rousing success by all, including ourselves.

Where did all those find their way to our community? Murrieta is far as it gets from Maine. Air fare to ship that many lobsters is staggering.

One day of attendance

There were too many lobster vendors to count.  Lobster mac & cheese?  You got it, over there.  Lobster with butter?  Cajun Lobster? Over there, buddy. Lobster gumbo? Same place 

Dig in!

Everywhere.  And, what was impressive, was the huge steam tank into which live lobsters were dumped. And then young men carried tubs of freshly steamed lobster over to the vendors. For more info, please access this site, Web site.

Happy people

Granddaughter Lily was ready for it all.  “Just don’t get in my way…”  Granddaughter Clara was “Ah.  I’ve had enough of it all.”

Somehow a petting zoo was worked into the festivities, and was ringed with children.  Clara’s time finally came.  Clara petted goats, sheep, pigs, chickens—all the usual. Chickens were amazing.  I have never seen a chicken stand quietly, let alone be touched. I believed firmly that those animals had had a dose of sedatives.

Lily returned, saying, “Steer Clara away from here, before she sees…”  the dancing chickens on Hawaiian Dancing Chicken Grill BBQ.

It was too late, Clara was there, sobbing.  “They killed them! They murdered innocent chickens.”

Clara sobbed all the way to the car.

So far away

I'm in the northern yellow, Mary is in the green

Living 12,000 miles away from my daughter sometimes hurts so bad that my shoulders droop and my heart breaks.  So far away, I am not there to teach her many things that my mother taught me: history of Mom’s adventures, stories from my childhood, how to make a pie—and, not there to rock her little boy and sing him songs my mother sang to me.

So we watch that little boy Benjamin play, talk, cry, and grow up over the computer and hear how our daughter Mary is doing in Switzerland.  

Recently she stepped in a pothole while crossing the street, fell and twisted her ankle.  Benjamin looked down at her right next to him, still holding his hand.  He moved so he could sit on her lap and pat her shoulder, and hug her.  It’s alright, Mummy.  It’s alright.

Facebook is good as a tool to see what they are doing.  Richard, Mary, and Benjamin went to a petting zoo recently, where the goats received more than they deserved, bags of goat feed to buy; those goats were well padded.  He patted their furry goat butts, and gave them all the love and smiles that weren’t mine.

To be so very far away and watch a two year old become a three year old is a year he grew up and I grew older. 

Dang it.