As you may recall I traveled back to Western New York State last month for the Celebration of my 50t…

As you may recall I traveled back to Western New York State last month for the Celebration of my 50th Anniversary of Graduation from Hornell High School the very same school from which my mother Gladys Forness Burns had graduated twenty-five years before me in 1933.

I was joined by my younger sister Roberta who has been working on the genealogy of our family. I should add that Roberta and I are the "bookends" of our family's six children, I as the eldest, she the youngest. As such I witnessed things she has never seen. I for instance could find the cottage on Loon Lake once owned by our maternal grandparents, a cottage she never visited.

We had a wonderful trip quite apart from the fun of my Fiftieth. We drove by old residences all the while bemoaning the progress which I'm sure current residents cherish. It was a heady experience which I had filed in my memory as I flew to Maine for the 20th Anniversary of the opening of Arrows Restaurant in Ogunquit. This restaurant's owners and I have become close friends over the years, but I was invited to speak at the Celebration as the first member of the media to review the restaurant in 1988. It too was a wonderful experience. Its a good thing I had to return to work before leaving on the Alaska Cruise. I was on sensory overload after my trip "back east".

Little did I realize that my stroll down my own memory ;lane had yet another charming mile to go. A few nights into our cruise I was invited along with my brother Dennis and his wife Mary Sue to join Joanne Blake at the Chef's Table. A maximum of twelve people are invited a couple of times during each cruise to be treated to the talents of the ship's Executive Chef. This was especially nice for Dennis and Mary Sue who were celebrating their 30th Wedding Anniversary. As we worked our way through Lobster Risotto and delicious Roasted Boneless Veal Shanks with an array of wonderful sauces a waiter tapped me on the shoulder and jokingly complained that he thought he had received his first love note from a passenger but alas the note was for me. He then handed me the note reproduced below:

Incredible! Although she and her husband now live in Sausalito she was not in our group and although she too graduated from Hornell High School four years after I did she had not attended the Alumni events last month. She just happened to be on that cruise and just happened to be seated with people who were traveling with us and there she sat a scant ten feet away. Needless to say both my brother Dennis and I had fun reminiscing with the "girl next door" although technically our houses were really back to back on parallel streets. Donna's mother and ours were friends who frequently exchanged recipes and she thinks she has copies of some of our treasured family recipes we cannot find. If Donna finds them I'd be happy to share them with you.

What serendipity! It was like living one of those quirky coincidences we used to read about in the Readers Digest issues of many years ago.