“Good morning, Grandma,” Virginia said. “Can we help with breakfast?”
“Of course, dears!” Anne gave me a smile and turned her attention to the girls. “I know… let’s make cinnamon rolls.” She gathered them at the counter and started taking down ingredients.
I went out to the porch and made up my cot. Danny returned from his own shower, and I asked about the dress code.
“We’re pretty laid-back,” he said. “Jeans are fine. Chinos. Whatever.”
He was in a good mood after his run, so he told me about his plan to ask Sabrina to marry him. He was so naturally likable that I found myself getting excited too.
We eventually decided to head inside, where we discovered a whirlwind of food and family. In addition to the cinnamon rolls, the girls were making fresh orange juice, a couple of pounds of sausage, and a huge hash brown casserole. Anne was directing it all, with Christy and Sabrina helping the younger girls, while Lynne was busy with a skillet of scrambled eggs.
I asked what I could help with, but Anne told me to go into the dining room. Harold was there with coffee and the newspaper. He was wearing pinstriped pajamas under a navy blue robe with “Granddad” embroidered in gold thread on the breast.
“Morning, Pop,” Danny said.
“Morning, Danny.” He glanced over his reading glasses at me. “Morning, Paul. Did you sleep well?”
“Yes, sir. Thanks.”
“Good to hear. Coffee’s on the buffet,” he said with a nod.
Danny picked up a cup and saucer and held them out to me.
“No thanks.” I sat down and tried not to fidget with nothing to do.
Harold noticed out of the corner of his eye. He folded the main section of his newspaper and slid it across to me. Then he found the sports pages and pulled them out.
“Thank you, sir.”
“You’re welcome. And you can probably dispense with the ‘sirs.’ You made your point.”
Danny grinned at me and sat down with his coffee.
“Navy plays Army tomorrow at the Rose Bowl,” Harold said as he opened the sports section. “Are you a football fan?”
We made small talk until Sabrina brought in glasses of orange juice. Jim joined us a minute later. Rich and Terry arrived as well, fresh from the shower.
I felt a bit guilty that the women were all working in the kitchen and we were relaxing with coffee, juice, and the newspaper. A snarky part of me wondered if women’s lib had bypassed the Carmichael clan, but I kept my mouth shut.
Virginia and Amber trooped in with platters of food, followed by the other girls and two boys I hadn’t met yet. The younger boy, John, hopped into Harold’s lap. His older brother, Steven, set down a tray of sausage and returned to the kitchen.
The women joined us a minute later with the rest of breakfast. The dining room table could seat twelve, but the older girls and Steven headed back to the kitchen and the table there. Grace climbed into her father’s lap. She was seven but looked younger because she was so small.
Christy leaned toward me. “My mom says she looks just like me when I was her age.”
“I can imagine.”
We passed plates and loaded them from whatever platter was nearest. The conversation picked up as we began eating.
The stereotype in my head was that the Admiral would run breakfast like a staff meeting, asking individual family members for reports or situation updates. The reality was far more endearing.
Harold pushed his scrambled eggs and hash browns into small mounds and cut up several sausage links. Then he made a game of feeding his grandson by racing the sausage pieces through the valleys and over the mounds. Sometimes the sausage-racer “crashed,” so they had to demolish a mound and eat it too.
Anne, Lynne, and Sabrina discussed the menu for Thanksgiving dinner.
Danny and Terry talked about The Right Stuff. Rich held Grace on his lap and pulled apart cinnamon rolls to feed her pieces while he talked to Jim. She looked like a little blonde bird, and they ate a half-dozen rolls between them.
I sat back and people-watched until I realize that Christy was doing the same to me. She smiled ear-to-ear when I looked at her.
“All right,” I said as though it was a grudging admission, “they’re pretty awesome.”
She beamed. “I knew you’d love them.”
I caught Anne looking at us. She nodded once and then returned her attention to Lynne and Sabrina.
A part of me had been worried that I’d stand out or be the center of attention (or worse). But they more or less ignored me. No, that wasn’t true.
They treated me like I was already part of the family.
Harry and Marianne arrived a little after ten, and I briefly saw their youngest, a four-year-old boy named Hal (Harold III on his birth certificate). After quick hugs for his grandparents, he ran back outside to play with John and Grace.
Harry was another good-looking Carmichael, basically a younger version of his father, albeit with the deeper blue of his mother’s eyes. He shook my hand and greeted me politely. Marianne looked a lot like Lynne. The women shared their mother-in-law’s blonde hair and blue eyes, but they were both several inches taller. And where Lynne tended to fade into the background, Marianne had the old-money charm and personality to match Anne’s. She smiled and gave me a welcoming hug.
“We’re so glad to meet you,” she said. “How do you like San Diego?”
“It’s nice,” I said. “The weather especially. It’s usually cold and rainy this time of year in Knoxville.”
“Oh, I know. I’m from back East too. Baltimore. Is this your first time in California?”
“He was born here,” Christy said.
“In San Diego?”
“Yeah. My uncle was stationed here,” I explained, “and my parents were visiting.”
“Oh, that’s right!” she said. “Birdy said your father was in the Navy. He flew jets, right?”
“Mmm hmm. A-4s. My uncle flew fighters, F-4s.”
“That’s what Harry started in. Then he transitioned to the F-14, so now we’re stationed here, at Miramar. But tell me more about you. Your father
works for the airlines now, doesn’t he? And you grew up in Atlanta?”
I told her about myself for a few minutes, until Anne sensed a lull in the conversation.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said. “But we should get to work in the kitchen.”
“Duty calls,” Marianne said to me with a smile.
“Christine, dear,” her mother said, “run and find Virginia and Amber.
They can help too.”
Christy lingered and gave me a kiss after the other women had left. Then she grinned and dashed off to find her nieces.
I thought the men would watch television or play football or do something typically manly (since the women were off doing “womanly”
things in the kitchen), but they surprised me. They cleared the dining room table and began shuffling cards.
“Ever played Rummy?” Danny asked Terry and me.
“Sure, of course.”
Terry nodded.
“All right,” Danny said. “The game is Florida Rummy…”
He explained the rules. It seemed simple enough, basically a variant of the game I already knew, but with several rounds that had different requirements to lay down. The Carmichaels took the game to a near-religious level of intensity. Danny explained that they played at every big family get-together and kept track of wins and losses like other families remembered birthdays and anniversaries.
The game was actually a lot more complicated than I realized, especially since the goal changed every round. But I surprised everyone, myself included, when I won the first game. I’d had a stupendous amount of luck with my draws, but I also had a good memory for what cards people were picking up and discarding. The Carmichaels collectively groaned when Jim read out the scores and mine was highest.
“Birdy!” Danny shouted toward the kitchen. “Come in here!”
She stuck her head around the door and looked at us, wide-eyed and more than a little anxious.