JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC

I’m just back from the Boston area and Cape Cod, where we had a family reunion revolving around my last living aunt and uncle, Nanette and Jim Eckert, who are in their mid-80s.

When my Aunt Nanette, my late father’s sister, mentioned that the Eckert family was planning a reunion and invited me along, I jumped at the opportunity. Who knows? It could be the last time that part of my family would be intact and assembled.

Like the rest of us Fitzpatricks, Nanette was born in Louisville, but after she married Jim, who’s also from Louisville, they moved around because of his job with GE. Among other places, they lived in Kansas City (before I got here in 1969) and Omaha. More than 40 years ago they landed in the Boston area. That’s where they raised their four children and where they stayed. Now they live in a retirement complex in the Boston suburb of Needham.

One of their sons and his wife, Bob Eckert and Marie Therese Wolf, live in Milan, Italy, but have a large vacation home in the town of Yarmouth on Cape Cod. Another son and his wife, John and Elaine Eckert, have a vacation home in Plymouth, adjacent to Cape Cod, on the Atlantic Ocean.

Besides Milan, we came from California, from Nevada, from Missouri, from Kentucky, from Washington D.C., from Ohio and from New Hampshire. (I might be missing a state or two.)

On Saturday, about 18 of us gathered at Bob and Marie Therese’s house in Yarmouth. On Sunday afternoon, we loaded up and traveled west and north to Plymouth, where we met up with John and Elaine Eckert and one of their three children and her husband and two children.

All but one person attending the reunion stayed in one of the two “reunion” houses Saturday and Sunday. The exception was me…My days of sleeping on air mattresses, bunk house style, are behind me. I got an Airbnb room in a house strategically located between Yarmouth and Plymouth.

The reunion was very gratifying. The climax came Sunday night at dusk in the backyard of the Plymouth house. Aunt Nanette summoned everyone around, and we stood in a loose circle. She expressed her gratitude for the reunion and specifically thanked the two grandsons who instigated it, David Temming and Tom Parker. Then, in a voice halting and breaking, she said, “And I want to thank all of you for the joy you’ve brought to my life.”

It was a short speech, but one of the best I’ve ever heard.

Here are the photos…

The Yarmouth home of my cousin Bob Eckert and his wife Marie Therese Wolf. It was built in about 1850 by a shipmaster named Capt. Solomon Taylor.

Uncle Jim

Aunt Nanette

One of their two sons, Bob Eckert, who lives in Milan, Italy

One of their two daughters, Alice Temming of Cincinnati

My cousin Sharron Hilbrecht of Louisville and Doug Parker, of Napa, CA. Doug is a son-in-law of Jim and Nanette.

Grays Beach on Cape Cod Bay is less than half a mile from Bob and Marie Therese’s house.

The boardwalk adjacent to the beach

I took a chance and parked in a handicapped space and was lucky…as usual.

Alms House Road, between the house and the beach

One of Bob and Marie Therese’s daughters, Mailina, left, agitated for a baseball game.

Back at the house, Ralph Till, husband of Claire Till, a granddaughter of Nanette and Jim, got in a little basketball.

Just before we headed off to Plymouth, I got our Yarmouth hosts to sit still for a moment. That’s Marie Therese Wolf, Lola Wolf, Mailina Wolf and Cousin Bob.

From one spectacular vacation house to the next. This one, within easy walking distance of the Atlantic Ocean in Plymouth, is owned by John and Elaine Eckert. It was built by Elaine’s late father, Henry Sentola.

John Eckert, taking care of his guests

What’s a reunion without some corn shucking?

White Horse Beach, Plymouth

Ralph Till and Claire (Eckert) Till

David Temming (fore) and Tom Parker, reunion instigators, and Lola Wolf

I, too, am grateful…for this great aunt and uncle!