Relative Something

The big event of the holiday weekend was to be the recent tradition of a pickleball tournament up at Wildwood Lodge Club, but the persistent on-and-off rain sprinkles were enough to keep the court surface too wet for safe combat. The tourney has been given a second attempt with whoever remains available starting at ten o’clock this morning.

My competitive gene is not feeling up to the effort, so I may become a member of the spectator benches to offer appropriate heckling support as needed.

In the absence of the tourney drawing all the member families together yesterday, the evening picnic feast became the focus of the day. Since the lodge and its surroundings are currently in a state of transition, Cyndie’s family became the host location, which meant the afternoon involved moving a lot of tables and chairs from down by the lodge.

Since the number of people from the association families attending was expected to be between 55 and 60, we were desperately hoping the troublesome rain would take a pause long enough to pull the whole thing off.

As an in-law to Cyndie’s family, I try to keep my opinions about how to proceed to a minimum while watching the three planners-and-doers work their magic as hosts in providing a stellar social event of the highest caliber. It becomes its own form of entertainment as each person takes on all the tasks at virtually the same time to do and re-do steps of gathering this and placing that just right.

It goes all the way to arranging cars in the best out-of-the-way places, which involved at least three tries to ultimately reach a settlement that worked.

I rode along with Cyndie to pick up enough ribs to feed an army. The restaurant selected for this catering job was conveniently located on the other side of the lake. When we arrived at peak business hours, it looked like it was going to be a serious challenge to navigate all the traffic of vehicles and people competing for a meal.

With luck on our side, we drove around all the cars that were stopping to park along the driveway and found an open spot right in front. Meandering past the throngs outside waiting for their names to be called for a table, we stepped to the host podium like we were VIPs checking in.

The woman managing Cyndie’s large order appeared and was thrilled about our parking spot. She was obviously in high-gear coping mode, reporting they were even busier than how busy she had expected it to be this holiday weekend Saturday night. They opted to bring us around to the back door of the kitchen to transfer the precious, hot cargo to the car.

With only one near-calamity of acceleration on the drive back, we delivered the ribs, sauces, and beans successfully without spilling a drop.

Soon, folks began arriving with arms full of appetizers, salads, and sides to fill out a menu that could sustain double the number of us in attendance. I took no pictures of the spectacular spread because I was either too busy gabbing with someone or munching on finger foods.

When the ribs were served, my hands were too sticky with barbecue sauce, and I got too engrossed in catching up on other people’s life adventures. When I finally thought of taking pictures while in the middle of a conversation, only by handing Elysa my phone and asking her for the favor did I get these snapshots of the continuing story exchanges still in process in the post-feast bliss of yet another annual Wildwood 4th of July picnic (despite the interruption of a brief nuisance rain shower that had occurred).

When evening came, we gathered ‘round
for the kind of picnic you’re supposed to have
And though people not present were sadly missed
There were fireworks displayed to rival all time

Wildwood, Wildwood
It’s been so long, but the change is good
Wildwoo-oo-oo-ooood

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