I FORGOT MY CHEESE?

From My Journal

July, 2014

This past weekend we drove up to Horsethief Lake State Park, across the river from The Dalles. That drive up and down 197 is rather neat. We met Sonia and Shauna along with their spouses and kids--a neat bunch. Bruce had their canoe along and Stinsons had Hannah’s kayak plus two other newly acquired kayaks and their raft. This park sits on Horsethief Lake, which is a part of the Columbia River that is cut off by the railroad. It was a nice place. We ate plenty, and had a birthday cake for Lorraine. Everybody except Haley, Lorraine, and myself spent time on the water in one or more of the aforementioned conveyances.
 

  

Bruce and Coda head out onto the lake. Coda is taking one final look at terra ferma.
 

Kevin, Sam, Shauna, and Hannah getting ready to take the kayaks out for a spin.
 

Bruce and Coda in canoe, Sam and Adam in raft, Shauna and Hannah in their kayaks. The two-man kayak in the background was photobombing my shot.
 

Another thing happened during the afternoon that just highlighted the detrimental effect age has on the human brain. To explain:  Lorraine and I brought some cheese for the picnic lunch--two pounds of cheddar, two pounds of pepper-jack, and three wedges of blue cheese. The other two families brought some other kinds. This group likes their cheese.

We ate some slices off both the two-pound blocks, and two of the blue cheese wedges. Shauna had put the two two-pound loaves in her cooler and left the last wedge of blue cheese sitting out on the table.

When it was time for us to leave I gathered up the only cheese that was observable (the blue cheese wedge) and put it into our cooler and was about to leave when Shauna asked if I had my cheese. I emphatically told her I had. She questioned that response by asking about the two loaves in her cooler. I of course had forgotten those two. That’s what I mean by losing ones faculties. This happened either because of advanced age or some serious head trauma. I HAD FORGOTTEN MY CHEESE!! Can you believe that? It was the first time that had happened to me and it was a shock, let me tell you.

So obviously, the cheese torch has passed to the next generation. A momentous event that I alone recognize in retrospect. Or maybe the others were just too polite to point it out to me.