The Shore

My brother recently recounted in his BLOG his first time at "the shore". Unfortunately, he didn't remember his first few times which were before he became aware of things, I suppose. I have a picture of him, which I'll publish when I find it, of him at "the shore" when he was almost one, or maybe just one. He remembers his first trip being when he was around 7 or 8.

"The shore" for us Drexler's was not always the same place-Whale Beach, Ocean City, Barnagate, Atlantic City, Seaside Heights, etc. We visited Whale Beach many times. Several church folks had homes in that small community, and we were invited to be with their families for one day at a time. I suppose because we were four young children, two of which were rambunctious boys, a day at a time was all any one in his/her right mind could handle. But, oh, how I enjoyed those days at Whale Beach.

I recall one particular time when the host family gave us a real special treat. That treat -- shrimp. I loved the stuff! I ate and ate and ate. I got really, really sick. And I layed off shrimp until I was an adult, then I retried it -- just a little bit. Still loved the taste, and I didn't get sick, so I upped the portion I ate and now I can enjoy any "all you can eat" portion of shrimp that any one wants to serve me.

We recently went on a cruise that had, this time, a daily midnight buffet. The previous cruises we went on, only had one midnight buffet each cruise. Well, I had hoped to get to at least one of these buffets, because shrimp was abundant and not measly, little baby shrimp. I mean these are jumbo shrimp and they are so good. Well, even though I miss out on the midnight buffets, I did have shrimp each evening for dinner.

I love ship dinners. You get a menu. Appetizer course, salad course, soup course, main course, dessert course. And, if there are more than one appetizer that you desire, you can have them. So, if I wanted six appetizers, I could have them. Well, I, on at least two occasions ordered TWO shrimp cocktail appetizers -- that was 12 jumbo shrimp. Yummmm.

I didn't gain any weight and that's mainly because I only ate breakfast and dinner, and I walked and walked and walked. Alan actually lost weight, mainly because he was sea sick for three days, poor thing.

So, back to the original thought of this BLOG -- "The Shore" It was the New Jersey Shore to which we went each summer, taken there by one or the other of our Uncle Joes. And we always had a great time. We'd get there around lunch time and have sand sandwiches (no stutter there, the sandwiches always ended up with lots of sand mixed in). Then we'd wear ourselves out chasing waves. Finally, the Uncle of the Day would take us to Johnson's Restaurant on the boardwalk for dinner. The meal, as my brother reminded me, chosen by most of us was open-faced turkey sandwich. It was made with real turkey, sliced fresh off the bone, and slathered with lots of turkey gravy. I haven't had one that good in years.

So, brother, to answer your question, yes I remember those trips to the shore with Uncle Joe E, or Uncle Joe S, and all of us tightly fitting in the car fighting for a window seat. I remember that on almost every trip one or the other of us would get car sick and throw up (I think it was usually me or Carl). But we did have a very good time once we were there.

Remember getting close to the beach with the car windows open, and seeing who could smell the "ocean" first. Actually, it was the smell of the bay, which was really a smell of dead clams and crabs, not a great smell, but it signaled to us that we were within 15 minutes of the sand and the sea. Don't you wish we could go back?

ttfn