Funeral & Day 1

We woke up early to attend Paul's funeral. Driving to Poughkeepsie in gray drizzle, we took 2 cars, as the folk's neighbor & dear friend, Joan came, too.

Lisa met us with red-rimmed eyes. I chocked a sob in commiseration. A great service, I learned Paul was a Check from a wealthy family, a holocaust survivor, and everything the Nazi's didn't take, they lost went the communist came to power. He moved to Israel, where they gave him a rifle as he came off the plane & just like that he was in the army fighting the war for independence. After such a life of suffering, we knew him in what was maybe the happiest time of his life, when he was a grandfather.

It was very touching when William comforted David. William will also miss Paul, who always gave him chocolate, and a dollar whenever he mispronounced his name, which he did on purpose to William's delight.

After the funeral, we had to leave to catch the boat. We drove down to Frankie & Eli's; Mike & Larry with us; William, David, Julia with the folks and Joan; Beth went alone. We changed , the van arrived & we loaded it all up. Although they got there late, we got to Cape Liberty port in Bayone, NJ in plenty of time to stand on the interminable line.

By the time we got on board, it was time to "muster." That's an emergency drill, where we put on life vests & gather in our muster zone. Kids are given bracelets of the theme-park sort, with the muster location.

We had our first dinner in the formal dining room. Such good food! Such good service! It felt odd to eat in a restaurant & not wait for a bill.

We went to Ocean Adventure orientation, that's the camp for the kids, which turned out successful for 2 out of our 3 kids; David thought there wasn't enough supervision.

We turned in—end of Day 1!