TVD | The Box

"There was a time/when everything was fine..." Marc Bolan sang.

And it's true. Maybe I was 7 or 8. Single digits.

My mom and dad, Ruth and Herm, played Scrabble most Saturday nights after a big meal at our home with their best friends, Pat and Howard. Drinking Scotch late into the evening, word challenges settled loudly via the ginormous dictionary more often used to decode the New York Times crossword puzzle that'd keep my mom glued to its magazine section each weekend.

And me? I'd be half asleep attempting to slog it through the Love Boat, then Fantasy Island, then the local news to catch some portion of Saturday Night Live just so I could talk about it the next day. Remember that odd benchmark - having seen what every other kid was buzzing about? Being part of it?

Back then it seems, in retrospect, I was actually buzzing on a warm houseful of food and laughs and well, family.

Pat passed away first in 2000 if memory serves me correctly, leaving the other three simply devastated. I'm not sure if there were any Scrabble nights afterward, really. My dad was next in 2006 and my mom passed away this past August, leaving Howard, the oldest by far of the four, the lone remaining celebrant of those evenings.

Then quietly, Howard passed away this past September 22nd, at 92.

And it was Howard, probably as a referral from my folks, who gifted me Queen's 'News of the World' the first holiday season of its release.

So, once more in 'the box' I have a sealed, first pressing, mint copy. With a sticker.

Queen - Sheer Heart Attack (Mp3)
Queen - All Dead, All Dead (Mp3)
Queen - Spread Your Wings (Mp3)
Queen - Fight From The Inside (Mp3)
Queen - It's Late (Mp3)