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A July Reunion
This is a beautiful time of year, with glorious mornings and afternoon showers. It’s a time to picnic and hike the tundra trail to see the abundance of alpine flowers at their height.
There are family reunions, too, as family units scattered over the country in the winter return to the summer place.
My good neighbors to the south, Bernice and Bob Bullock, combined a celebration of their golden wedding anniversary with a reunion of Bernice’s brothers and sisters the other day. Bernice is one of the Dakan children, and all five were there. Most readers know the pictures of Lew Dakan and he was there, doing what he does best. The other Dakans include Alan, Mary and Frank, and they range in age from 71 to 81. All are as talented in their own way as Lew, and all seemed to be enjoying their get-together, which they try to have at least once a year.
The anniversary is really in May, but this seemed like a better time to have the party, and a group of friends and neighbors came to eat hamburgers and watch Bob and Bernice try to break two of the sturdiest piñatas ever made.
These days, when getting to the crystal anniversary seems like a minor miracle, a golden anniversary is a genuine achievement. Such a moment requires a heroic setting, like a July afternoon in the shadow of Mount Meeker. It’s no wonder that families come from thousands of miles away to celebrate anniversaries and weddings in our mountains.
One young couple at the Bullocks’ had been married just the day before, at the St. Malo Chapel.
As the presents were opened one by one, the youngest celebrant, charming, red-headed, three-year-old Annie, yawned in the summer sun and went off to take a nap. Her uncle, the Bullocks’ son, gave a loving toast to his parents. Chris is a physician in Boston, and will soon be a psychiatrist. He spoke about the importance of the marriage process and the warm and loving relationship between husbands and wives, and children, brothers and sisters, and friends and neighbors. Then the Bullocks opened a present from the group a beautifully carved ironwood owl.
Soon after, everyone went home we had a nice rain shower.
Columns
© 1985 – 2003, David E. Steiner
Allenspark Wind Columns:
Back to the Hilltop Guild Bazaar
The Estes Park Hardware Store [1988]
On the Death of Otto Walter, Postmaster
A Whine About Telephone Service [1991]
On the Death of Charles Eagle Plume
Rumors About a Visit by the Pope
The Visit of Pope John Paul II
Devolutionizing Big Government
The Estes Park Trail-Gazette Columns:
How Old is Charles Eagle Plume?