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You Need to Work on Your Sweeping

You Need to Work on Your Sweeping

By Rich Grady

It’s been nearly four years since my wife passed away. I think of her all the time. Every morning when I walk into the kitchen, I grab the broom and start to sweep, as she always did. I am always amazed at how many crumbs and dirt particles fill the dustpan – far more than I see when they are all spread out on the floor. This is something that would not have surprised my wife. She understood all of the realities of keeping and managing a house, and much more than that.

My wife worked as a teacher at the local elementary school. She volunteered in the community. She helped our parents as they got older. She took care of our kids – she knew where they had to be and when, and was their chauffeur before they could drive. She went to their games, cheered for them, and coached or refereed when needed. She took care of them when they were sick, bought them clothes as they grew, and gave them presents on their birthdays and at Christmas. And when we were blessed with grandkids, she was an amazing grandmother. I will always be proud to have been her husband.

When she was gripped by cancer for the third time, I did my best to do all the chores that she had done for decades, but could no longer do as she battled the disease and endured the various treatments and hospital stays. I began to do the laundry, fold the clothes, go grocery shopping, run errands, vacuum, wash the floor, dust, polish the furniture, plant flowers, water the plants, clean the bathrooms, do the dishes, figure out meals, pay the bills, and cook. And I’m sure I left some things off the list of chores that she did before I took over.

When we were both working full-time, I responded willingly to her occasional requests for help, and thought I was doing my best to be helpful. I truly appreciated all that she did, but never actually knew how much time and effort it took to perform all of the chores around the house, until she got very sick and I needed to step up. As I became more aware of the amount of work through my own efforts, I began to feel that I could’ve and should’ve done more over the years to share the workload. She did a lot without my help, and without complaining or bragging about it.

She had always told me that I was capable of doing the chores around the house that she did, but until I took over, I wasn’t sure. I sought her reassurance that I was doing things right when it was my turn. I didn’t always put things away where she put them, and I didn’t always fold or iron the clothes the same as she did, but she didn’t get riled when I’d teasingly confess my slip-ups. She would just give me an amused smile.

When her end was near, but before I would even let that possibility creep into my head, she said to me, “You’re doing a good job – you’ll be fine on your own.” I teared up – I didn’t want to think about being on my own, and she could see that it made me very sad to hear her say those words. With perfect timing, she delivered a truthful punchline that made me laugh, which was:

“But you need to work on your sweeping.” She knew that was a true statement, and so did I. We both laughed, as we often did together.

And so, it has become my daily mantra to speak her words out loud as I enter the kitchen and reach for the broom. It has given me a whole new outlook on housework and life in general. It also reminds me of my wife’s sense of humor and kind but direct manner. She was

down-to-earth and could quickly reduce complex situations to their simple, honest essence. To me, she was amazing, and I always told her so. I still do. And every morning, I sense a knowing grin on my wife’s face as she sees me look at the dustpan in amazement at the crumbs that I sweep up, even though I can’t see them on the floor – it’s a gift that keeps on giving.

Diners

Diners

By Leo Racicot

Diners are as American as mom and apple pie. In the late part of the 18th century, an enterprising Providence, Rhode Island man, Walter Scott, began serving night workers (newspaper employees, nighttime vending hawkers, graveyard shift factory workers) sandwiches and coffee out of his horse-drawn wagon. The service was an instant hit and soon evolved into the dining cars of today.      I love diners and diner food. Who in Lowell hasn’t eaten, or still eats, at The Owl Diner on Appleton Street? It seems to have always been there. When I knew it, it was owned by the Shanahan Sisters. Its sign read Four Sisters Owl Diner. One of the sisters, Bridget, owned a beauty salon out in Dracut. Bridget did my sister’s hair for many years and Diane always said Bridget was her favorite of the sisters. Owl’s tiny parking lot and the surrounding area is always packed-to-the-rafters, especially on weekends. Just try getting a table on Saturday and Sunday mornings. My routine on Sundays was to run next door to Palmer News, grab the Sunday Boston Globe, the Sunday NYTimes and eat my breakfast in The Owl while reading them. A delightful memory…The usually loud, bustling Owl boasts a diverse patronage: popular among politicians, tourists and college students, it’s become a classic comfort spot for generations.

The decades-old Club Diner on Dutton Street has been doling out hearty breakfasts and lunches since the 1930s. Run by the hard-working LeVasseur Family, the aromas emanating from its stoves dare you to keep walking without wanting to come in for one of its tasty breakfasts, homemade soups and lunches. When I first moved back to the city in 2007, I made it a habit to have breakfast there every morning. Breakfast, diner coffee and a newspaper are my idea of heaven. The Club was not a far walk from my house and I got to know the staff, Bobby, the cook, and his dad, also Bob, pretty well, looked forward to seeing their friendly faces each and every morning. I stopped eating there every day only when I noticed I was getting to be the size of The Hindenburg.

My friend and CTI co-worker, Connie Carrigg, loved to take me to Cameo Diner in Centralville. We often stopped in for a bite and cup of “Joe” in between shifts or on Saturdays. Connie knew everybody in the place, staff and customers. Connie was such a spirited presence, had what I call “star gravity” that whenever she ate there, she drew crowds around the table to hear her stories, her infectious “good time gal” laugh. Connie worked for a time as a waitress and liked to tell how, any tme a male customer took the liberty of pinching her on the behind, she’d quickly snap, “Buddy, it ain’t on the menu!” How I miss dear, funny Connie…

I think back on the great times my travels took me to diners outside of Lowell, During my years working at O’Leary Library, ULowell, I was befriended by a couple, N. Blau and Joe, and their interesting circle of musician and writer friends.  The Blau “set” always had a party going. N. was so exuberant and enthusiastic, she had the group feeling we were on our way to the Met Gala or the Academy Awards, even if we were just going up the street for coffee. She, herself, was a hoot. In those days, she was known as N. Blau, light opera star and phone sex operator (well, college tuition was steep, even back then). I was fortunate in the ’80s and early 90s to know a group of women, confident, attractive, who knew who they were and who let you know who they were: N., Connie, Jane Wall, Ruby Killelea.      Anyway — with N. Blau, many was the time I found myself coasting along a post-midnight highway towards Boston when she had a sudden impulse to eat at Boston’s Leather District’s Blue Diner. It was beyond fun to be there, while the rest of the city was dark and asleep, eating in its eerie after-hours lighting, surrounded by college kids, night workers on their break, mostly revelers spilling out of the nearby bars after last call. Food always tastes better in a diner, the greasier, the better, washed down with bottomless cups of fresh coffee, being regaled by story after story, eavesdropping on the people at the table behind, getting to see the latest nighttime fashions and fads, even spotting a celebrity or two refueling after a day’s grueling performance schedule. I’ll never forget my Blue Diner nights. I can still see the gigantic blue coffee cup on its roof, as we drove around the South Station neighborhood around and around in our search for a parking space.  Eating, chatting, laughing till sun-up, that, for me, was The Blue Diner.

In fact, I liked diners so much, it got so that whenever I’d run into one I didn’t know, I’d head inside to sample its fare, its ambience. Let’s see. There was The Rosebud in Somerville’s Davis Square, Average Joe’s in Action (where they’d shout out your name when your order was ready), The Paul Revere Diner in West Medford.      On one of our trips to New York City, Joe and I had to check out Manhattan’s historic Empire Diner. It did not disappoint. Years later, while strolling the west side of Chelsea with Edmund White, we both agreed we were “starving” and wound up in a diner close by. We were at the counter noshing away when I remembered the Empire (not remembering where exactly it was located) and said to Ed, “Years ago, Joe and I ate at The Empire Diner and loved it.” Ed smirked and replied, “Yeah, you’re in it. It changed its name a while ago.”   We both had a hearty laugh about that.

It bears mention that probably the most famous “dining car” I’ve eaten in was owned and operated by none other than the great Vincent Price. Audiences know Price most of all for his performances in ’60s and ’70s horror movies. But he was anything but scary. A very refined, very cultured man, he was a splendid gourmet cook and respected art collector. He loved travel, especially in the Pullman dining carsof his yesteryears,  and could discourse on the golden age of travel for hours. In about 1965, Price converted his Cortez Club Car into his own personal diner, installing it on Malibu Beach, turning it into a mini-restaurant and lounge for guests he liked to entertain with his plethora of recipes, gathered from his many travels throughout the world. His melt-in-your-mouth lamb sausage was out-of-this-world, so succulent and tender, you thought you were eating clouds… And why not?  I’ve often thought of diners and diner food as “pure Heaven”

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Club Diner

Blue Diner

Cameo Diner

N. Blau

The Empire Diner

Owl Diner

Vincent Price in his private dining car

Seen & Heard: Vol. 8

 Welcome to this week’s edition of Seen and Heard, in which I catalog the most interesting things I’ve seen, heard and read over the previous seven days. 

Book Review: 1929: “Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History and How it Shattered a Nation” by Andrew Ross Sorkin – This book has been on the New York Times best seller list for many weeks – with good reason, it turns out. I’m familiar with Sorkin from his economics writing for the Times and the various business conferences he organizes. At the beginning of this book he explains that after his last one, “Too Big to Fail” which was about the 2008 financial crisis, he became intrigued by the 1929 crash. I’ve studied that event in history class, read several books about it, and assumed I knew what I needed to know, but Sorkin’s book puts it all in a much clearer context. Specifically, the 1929 crash was triggered by people going crazy with stock market investments. Established figures on Wall Street, before things like insider trading were illegal, manipulated the market to make themselves fortunes and thought there was nothing wrong with it. Countless others in the country wanted to become wealthy too and jumped into the market. Like real estate promoters before 2008 who said the value of real estate never goes down, stock promoters in the 1920s said the same about that market. To accelerate their gains, people bought stock “on margin” which meant putting up $1000 of your own money and borrowing $9000 from the brokerage so you could buy $10,000 worth of stock. The stock was held by the broker for collateral. The market went up and up and up until it didn’t. In our hypothetical, when the value of the stock sunk below $9000, the brokerage would demand more cash from the investor to make up the difference. If the investor didn’t have the cash – and most did not – the brokerage would sell the stock to recoup its money. More stocks being offered for sale drove the price further down which is what precipitated the crash. The revelation to me was that within two years the stock market had stabilized and was behaving rationally. But in the meantime, thousands of banks across the US failed. With no deposit insurance, people lost whatever savings they had. More importantly for the economy, banks were unable to extend credit which froze up the economy. Sorkin suggests it was a crisis of confidence as much as one of economics. The new president, Franklin Roosevelt, had mixed success with the solutions he proposed, but his positive demeanor and cheerful personality made people feel more confident which is one reason why Roosevelt was deemed to be so successful. At the conclusion of the book, Sorkin sounds a bit pessimistic. He says in 1929 as in 2008, it was clear to many that the economy was at great risk but because so much profit was being made hardly anyone was willing to apply the brakes. He sees that as a function of human nature and is doubtful we will learn any lessons from these past mistakes. 

Television – Winter Olympics week 3 – I didn’t see much live Olympic coverage this week but tried to catch the highlights on YouTube and follow events online. US women Olympians finished the week strong with the hockey team coming from behind to beat Canada for the gold medal. Skier Mikaela Shiffrin won a gold medal in slalom, and Alysa Liu won a gold medal in figure skating. Then on Sunday, the US men’s Olympic hockey team beat Canada in sudden death overtime. The Olympics ended Sunday but I’ll do some concluding comments next week. 

Newspaper feature – Last weekend, the Boston Sunday Globe Sunday Arts section launched a new feature. “One Special Thing” is a weekly series in which a member of the Globe Arts section “will choose something that speaks to us and sings to us, something timeless that we return to in good times and bad.” The opening essay was about “The Friends of Eddie Coyle”, the 1970 debut novel by George V. Higgins which was later made into a classic movie that starred Robert Mitchum. I think what the Globe plans to do is a little like what I try to do with this Seen & Heard column so I look forward to seeing how they handle it in the weeks ahead. 

Newspaper article: “Inside the Debacle That Led to the Closure of El Paso’s Airspace” in New York Times on February 14, 2026. Late on Tuesday, February 10, 2026, the FAA announced that the air space over El Paso, Texas, was closed for national security purposes for the next ten days. I remember seeing that news and thinking, are we about to attack Mexico? Is there a terrorist threat? Neither of those made sense because the response would not be limited to one small segment of the US-Mexican border. Early the next morning I watched on Reddit as people who’d been scheduled to fly into or out of El Paso had their plans upended with no warning. Then by mid-morning, the restriction had been lifted. A multiple choice flow of explanations ensued from “administration sources,” none of which sounded credible. This Times story offers some explanation and context. The US military has developed some kind of laser that can be used against drones. It’s important to develop such capabilities because the use of drones by Ukraine and Russia are revolutionizing warfare and the US has to be prepared. But the “Secretary of War” wants to use the weapon to shoot down drones purportedly being used by drug cartels to carry product across the US border. Because the US Customs and Border Patrol is charged with defending our national border, they wanted access to this weapon. However, the FAA, still scarred by the preventable tragedy that occurred last year when an Army helicopter collided with a passenger plane landing at Reagan Airport killing all on both aircrafts, wants everyone to proceed cautiously with this weapon lest innocent aviators and passengers be shot out of the sky. In this El Paso incident, the military and border patrol ignored the FAA’s concerns and shot off the laser at a supposed drug drone. With its concerns being ignored, the FAA promptly closed the air space which then got everyone’s attention. You’d like to think the adults in the room will figure this out so innocent people will be safe but that would be wishful thinking. Oh, and multiple sources told the NYT that the target was not a drone but a mylar balloon that slipped away from some kid’s birthday party and floated across the border. 

Obituary – Jesse Jackson – Rev. Jesse Jackson died on Tuesday, February 17, 2026, at age 84. In its obituary, the New York Times called him “the nation’s most influential Black figure in the years between the civil rights crusades of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the election of Barack Obama.” Jackson was a superb orator who ran twice for president. His speeches, particularly at the Democratic conventions in 1984 and 1988, were inspiring. I want to say that Jackson was ahead of his time because many of the positions he proposed which seemed radical back then make abundant sense today, especially in view of our current political climate. But rather than being ahead of his time, perhaps Jackson helped shape our present in a good way. Jackson’s 1984 Rainbow Coalition, which sought to mobilize racial minorities, the working class, LGBTQ individuals, and other marginalized communities into a powerful political movement never materialized but should still be pursued. It’s needed more than ever today. 

Obituary – Robert Duvall – Actor Robert Duvall died on February 15, 2026, at age 95. He had been in too many movies to mention and all of his performances that I recall were excellent. The one that always stood out for me was his portrayal of LTC Kilgore in the 1979 film Apocalypse Now. Kilgore commanded an air cavalry squadron that conducted an air assault on a Viet Cong village. This portion of the movie was subordinate to the plot but it was my favorite part of the film.

Happy 100th to the town become a city!

Happy 100th to the town become a city!  – (PIP #98)

By Louise Peloquin

 L’Etoile – March 1, 1926 front page

 LOWELL IS JUBILANT

     It is estimated that one fourth of the population is participating today, one way or another, in the three different events to celebrate Lowell’s 100th anniversary – Grandiose ceremony at the Auditorium this afternoon broadcast by WEEI.

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BALL AT THE MAGNIFICENTLY DECORATED AUDITORIUM THIS EVENING

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     We count a total of approximately 30,000 people expected to participate today in the various centennial events to celebrate Lowell’s incorporation as a“town.”

     This morning at 9:30, thousands of children attended the commemorative ceremonies at the High School Cyrus W. Irish Memorial Auditorium and in different rooms and classes of the other city schools.

     This afternoon, as we go to press at 2, a compact audience is gathered at Memorial Auditorium for the most grandiose choral, musical and speech program Lowell has ever had. The program is broadcast by Boston radio WEEI to an innumerable audience up and down the East coast. It is the first time a Memorial Auditorium event is transmitted by a major station.

     This evening, at 8:15, a grand ball will be held at Memorial Auditorium. One of the evening’s most unusual decorations will be an enormous birthday cake, lit by 100 candles and displayed on stage. It is so big that a man can hide behind it without being seen. This cake is relatively inexpensive considering its size and its decoration made of real cream. An expert pastry chef worked on it all day yesterday.

    The directors ask the public to take special note of the fact that this is the first time Lowell is honored in its own auditorium by a radio station as reputable as WEEI. To properly fulfil its task, WEEI had to bring $2,000 worth of equipment to Lowell and install it in one of the apartments off of the balcony. From this location, newscaster A.F. Edes will transmit the program to Worcester where it will be relayed to the central station in Boston.

     Mr. Edes, seated in the rear, will have a headset, a microphone and, with one press of a button, will broadcast the entire program to a vast audience. 

     At the ball tonight, ticket holders will be admitted at the East Merrimack street entrance from 8:15 to 8:45. Afterwards, the main doors will open to those without tickets. The public will be admitted until Fire Chief Saunders informs the police that the room is filled to capacity.

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THE CENTENNIAL BALL

     From 8:15 to 8:45 this evening, Centennial Ball ticket holders will be admitted at the East Merrimack Street Auditorium entrance. At 8:45, the main doors will be opened to those who do not have tickets. Doors will close when the hall is full, on the decision of Fire Chief Edward F. Saunders. The Grand Centennial Orchestra will give a one-hour concert, to be followed by traditional dance demonstrations and then the ball will be in full swing. At midnight, all of the lights will be dimmed. Confetti and streamers will rain down upon the dancers and attendees and everyone will sing the Star Spangled Banner.

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     SPECIAL MENU AT MARIE’S RESTAURANT

MARIE’S restaurant on Central Street, famous for the quality of its dishes and for its warm atmosphere, is offering a special centennial celebration menu. Before the theater, the Auditorium ball or late in the evening, perfect, first-rate service will be offered to all. (1)

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1) Translations by Louise Peloquin.