Ronald McDonald House Guitar Auction Update

Yo, Yo,  according to the RMcDHouse Folks, the Ebay Auction of the guitars is going to start possibly as early as this Monday.  They will be putting up one guitar at a time.  As soon as I get more info, I will update this post.  In the meantime, if possible, spread the word.  All proceeds from the Auction will go to the RMcDHouse Charity.

For a review of the guitars being auctioned see the earlier post, Ronald McDonald House Charity, Guitar Auction.  (use the Search Feature)

Dan

Our Day In The Sun (Chapter 49)

One reason we remained close to our friends on the road; we didn’t spend every waking second hanging around together. We were all busy daily, constantly battling the elements to keep our houses intact. But, you have to work at friendships, so we agreed to meet up every few weeks at each other’s houses for lunch or dinner.

All of us had lived on the sea in at least two different locales prior to Manse Road. Tom and Cece had lived on Catalina Island, California and John and Felicity had lived in an exclusive beachside area of Sarasota, Florida. Cath and I had lived on the sea in Malibu and all of us had lived on the sea in Cayman in Condos on the lee shore; but none of us were ready for the amazing assault that the windswept reef perpetrated on every man-made substance.

After having rebuilt practically the entire exterior, Tom casually asked me if I had used Stainless Steel nails and screws.

“No”, I replied.

“Well, that’s a shame because that’s the only thing that can take the salt air here.” Tom stated.

I was inclined to disbelief but after one month, a pair of galvanized hinges I had used to hang a gate, crumbled and failed. I was now a convert. From then on every nail, screw and piece of metal hardware I purchased whether for interior or exterior use, was stainless. Man, were they expensive. Fifty-cents per #6, 2 inch stainless screw, and nails weren’t much cheaper. I honestly thought about leaving them as tips at restaurants. I ultimately started doing all my metal hardware buying from a Marine Supplier. Living on Manse Road was like living on a boat, so it was a natural to use Marine hardware. The best grade you could buy was solid brass, chrome-plated fittings. I used those on storm shutters I built for the windows and doors. They were sky-high expensive.

Salt-tolerant plants thrived, but only a few were flowering and other than the coconut and almond no fruit trees could survive; with one exception, the Noni-fruit. This was known by various names, Wild Mulberry, Wild Soursop, even Devil-tree, because it was almost impervious to harm from man or the sea. It had at least 2 other names, Cheese Fruit and Stink-Fruit; with good reason. Although in it’s initial flowering and fruiting phase, the tree had a pleasant coconut fragrance, as the fruit “Ripened” it positively reeked, smelling for all the world like a dirty diaper pail. In this age of disposable diapers, for those of you who’ve never smelled a diaper pail, believe me they are rank.

Strangely enough, the fruit was highly prized by Jamaicans and Caymanians alike, for its juice’s reputed pain-relieving benefits. It sold in Health Food stores for about $25 dollars a liter. We were constantly cutting the fruit and giving it away because every phase of the fruit’s smell drove Catherine around the twist. But of course, the more we cut, the more they grew as with the Coconut trees. Soon we were up to our eyeballs in Stink-fruit. I even made some Noni-Juice, just to see what all the fuss was about. I even wrote the song “Froot Joose” as a bit of an homage to it and Fruit Juices in General.

By taking a plastic pail and filling it with Noni fruit, leaving it for a couple of weeks in a dry warm place, like the water heater closet, a juice began to drain from the rotting fruit. It was the color of coca-cola but stank to high heaven. Pineapple juice could slightly mask the horrific flavor and I tried some with it. It was paralyzing. It didn’t seem to kill pain, just made me grouchy and lethargic.

So I sent our man Ivan the Gardener home with a couple of quarts and he was a happy camper. We just kept offering the fruit to any passersby and kept up with the surplus that way. I still find it hard to believe but there are people who use it regularly and swear by it. As Lawrence, Mavis’ husband said, “The pain, she can’t hide from the juice”.

Without Ivan and occasionally his brother Sammy, both from Old Harbor, Jamaica, the house would have fallen down around us. Catherine and I worked 6-8 hours a day just maintaining the status quo once we got the house up to speed. The tropics have a way of destroying everything man makes and replacing it with plant life. Getting help was a real challenge. Technically, you had to obtain a work permit for your help, but there was a look-the-other-way system that thrived, mainly because Caymanians would get a work permit for several Jamaicans and then send them out to find jobs on their own, taking a cut from their pay from every job.

So there was always the lingering fear that Immigration would come looking and sweep up the help, fining the homeowner in the process. But that’s life in the Tropics and frankly on Planet Earth as a whole. Fear is the operative adjective for virtually everything down here, but it was more pronounced when you were not a citizen of the country in which you lived.

As many Foreign Residents would say, “There are two sets of laws here, one for Caymanians and one for everyone else.”

Our Day In The Sun (Chapter 48)

But on so many nights, the wind blowing afresh directly off the sea, the stars shining brightly and the scattering of lights along the seashore as it curved away towards East End, we would sit in our loungers and marvel at the scene. When the moon was full, it rose over Bodden Bay and the waves and ripples were touched with silver.

If we were forced inside, we had no TV, rarely listened to the one radio station and had ample time to read, play scrabble or rummicube or do crossword puzzles. I devoured books by the hundreds. Being a student of Eschatology or Endtime Prophecy, I was very familiar with the many scenarios which Christ laid out as being in existence at His return. One line that had always puzzled me was, “There shall be signs and wonders in the heavens.” Luke 21:11

At night, reclining on our “Moon Loungers” (only Mad Dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun) I pondered that saying and then as I was looking straight up, caught my breath. There it was, a satellite in Geosynchronous Orbit, passing overhead, like a moving star. Twenty minutes later, another one passed overhead in the same trajectory. Now if that isn’t a wonder, I don’t know what is. 24/7/365 Satellites are winging across the sky, like miniature moons, reflecting the sunlight back to Earth from their shiny surfaces. On top of that, there were dozens of high-flying jets, flying regular routes from North America to South America. They too were lights in the sky and as used to them as we have become as human beings, they are truly a marvel and a sign of the times.

The absolute best part of living on Manse Road was our friends. There was such an electic mix of people from everywhere. Two doors down, an American couple who were native Californians, lived in a beautiful yet simple house which was breeze-filled. Tom and CeCe were lively, gregarious folks who loved to travel, had amazing stories to tell and were hospitable to the nth degree. Many happy nights were spent dining at each other’s homes along with the Bartons a couple from Britain. John and Felicity were happily married, loved life and were a joy to be around. The six of us developed enduring friendships which last to this day. Sadly, John passed away a couple of years ago, but his memory lives on.

In fact, in many ways Tom, Cece, John and Felicity had much to do with our moving onto the road. John and Felicity had been finishing the building of their beautiful home when we had taken the drive that fortuitous day and seen “Morning Glory Cottage” for sale. I felt that if someone was going to invest that kind of time and effort into what was a marginal area, he must see something that others had overlooked. But Tom and Cece had seen the same things. Their well-kept house and obvious commitment to living there were not lost on me that same day. All of us as it turned out had lived in Condos, given up on it and decided to take the plunge into home ownership.

However, both couples surely thought we were completely insane taking on the rehabbing of the 100 year old cottage. There were major problems with the roof, the house leaned out of plumb and looked like a pigsty when we bought it. The party we threw to facilitate the removal of the last 50 fleas was a chance for our neighbors to see the inside of the house.

As Felicity said in her high, pretty voice, “My dears, I think you’re very brave!”

She was right. The inside was a hodgepodge of fake wood paneling, all the rage circa 1970, but dark and ugly here by the sea. One bathroom had a mustard colored tub and shower and sink. The kitchen was a cramped hell hole. There were huge cupboards which housed the washing machine, sticking out into the living area, totally obscuring the sea view.

In the middle of the floor was an access to the cistern which was useless, the cistern being cracked beyond repair. The access hole had a six inch lip which was a real ankle breaker. All of the interior doors were louvered, which is fine if you aren’t trying to air condition rooms separately. I remembered the renters had complained that the window air in the Master Bedroom didn’t work well. I took one look at the louvered doors and knew instantly that was the problem.

One major thing we had learned from our Caymanian carpenters and workman who had valiantly worked on the exterior; Reusing and recycling. We never threw anything away unless it was termite infested. All of the furniture inside was stained a hideous “Antique Green”, another carry over of the rehab in the 70’s. The furniture itself was fine, just butt-ugly in color. We re-stained everything a mahogany color, repainted all the drab brown walls in pink, got rid of all the extraneous cupboards, knocked out part of a wall so that sunlight and air and a view reached the kitchen and tiled the entire house with sand pink tile from Spain, laid on the diamond.

I kept the louvered doors and sealed one side of them with finished veneer plywood to keep the beachy look but allow the house to be compartmentalized for air conditioning. Over the veneer we hung top to bottom mirrors, which visually opened the rooms up from the inside and served the practical purpose of checking oneself out before entertaining or going to town.

All of the ocean facing windows and doors were trimmed in white casings. This framed the view and along with the pink interior walls, caused the view to explode. Cece would come in and say, “Tom why is their view so much prettier than ours?” Tom would go ballistic and say, “Dammit Cece it’s the same view woman! We only live 2 houses down!”

I didn’t have the heart to tell him that the dark wood frames on their doors and windows and the black screened porch sucked the life from the aqua colors.