Mon Nov  3 08:02 EST 1997
Weekend Update: Halloween 1997

The subject line doesn't tell you about my halloween.  Not that Halloween
matters all that much to me - night of greed sponsored by the American
Dentist and Candy association.  I prefer my candy in liquid form.

As some of you know, my father-in-law will enter his retirement after
he preaches on November 9. In preparation for that my wife Joy,
her sisters Faith and Hope, and their husbands met in Butler, New Jersey
to help move what was left of the contents of the parsonage to his
retirement house in Greentown, Pennsylvania.  As always, it was good to
get together with my wife's family.  We left the kids at home so it was
just us adults.

After we arrived we discovered that Dad C had not reserved a truck and
it was the end of the month on the weekend.  Uh-oh.  Part of Friday
was spent on the phone locating a vehicle to transport the remaining bulky
furniture.  All in all, and despite the last-minute activities, the
mechanics of the move went fairly well.  I believe that some of the
emotional effects of the move were more of the story.

Joy and I spent the final night in Butler in mom's bed, where she died.
It wasn't spooky, but just one of the many reminders of a continued loss.
I saw a picture of the headstone that Dad took for us and it is very nice
with an early photo of Tom and Millie in a small oval at the top center of
the stone; young married people brimming with happiness.  We all joked,
as we do when we get together, deflecting the knowledge that it was 6 months
to the day that mom died; deflecting the knowledge other things where we
will feel it all over again.

Our reunion was functional and short.  We all had to be back and doing
the things we have going on in our lives.  Joy and I rode back home in
five unrelenting hours of driving rain.  We're facing a lot of chores
missed by being away a full third of October (on the Cape, in San Jose,
and NJ and PA).  We're looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas
which will come sooner than any one of us thinks.

Lots of love from mine to yours,

Mark
        __________          Mark Metcalfe
     .- __   / -- -\        Cadence Design Systems, Inc.
    / <___> ___  | |\-      270 Billerica Road MS04
 .^| _---_ /   \ =   / \    Chelmsford, MA 01824
 |o |  =  / o | |   ||  |   Phone: (978) 446-6451
 =0=======0==|  |----|  |=  Fax:   (978) 446-6351
  \_\_/    \_\_/   \_\_/    metcalfe@cadence.com