The Summer Barbecue Season

Tomorrow is July 1st, the heart of summer, and more importantly, barbecue season here in the U.S.  And today I am featuring a photograph taken in the backyard of my Uncle Jack (my mother's brother) and Aunt Helen's home many years ago in Evergreen Park, just to the west of the South Side Chicago neighborhoods of Beverly and Brainerd (where my sister Susan and I grew up).  Uncle Jack was hosting a barbecue, and although my sister thinks it strange that he has everyone sit on the cement driveway instead of the lawn, and that he did his barbecuing in the garage, it all seems okay to me.  Uncle Jack had a hernia operation after Pearl Harbor so that he could join the Air Force and take part in WWII.  It was a sobering experience.  He slogged through the jungles of New Guinea, the Philippines, and God knows where else, and contracted malaria.  Because of this, his health suffered for the rest of his life.  Our family always made fun of him and his wife because they refused to be treated by anyone other than the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and made frequent car trips there.  However, as I have gotten older and have seen our health care system in action, the more I realize they were absolutely correct, and wise before their time.  In any case, this post is supposed to be about barbecues, and families enjoying the summer and just being together, a poignant example of which is this photograph.  And yes, I have featured it before on this blog, but I don't care.  And so, from left to right in this photo are my grandmother Louise (my mother's mother), my mother Mary, my father Nelson, Uncle Jack, and my Uncle Bill (my mother's other brother, visiting from Cleveland).  If I could build a time machine and go back there, I would do so in an instant.  Time to look for a DeLorean and a flux capacitor on e-bay, I guess.  And by the way, I myself took this photograph.  Definitely the sign of a child prodigy.