Just another Cape Cod day

“crane on its way!”
-text message received in my e-mail inbox yesterday
Considering that I am deployed more often than not, I can safely say that I did my fair share of sand hauling, cement mixing and bricklaying whenever I was on the Cape.

I don’t remember exactly how many years ago it was (I am guessing maybe five?) that I was at home on leave and noted an unassuming circular slab of cement curing behind the house.

“What’s this for?” I asked my Dad.
“That’s for the lighthouse I’m gonna build.”
“Oh” I said, as if Dad had just told me he was headed back out to Stop and Shop to buy another 24-pack of ramen, because it was on sale.

2008 progress. Where I was schooled in art of bricklaying (really, it’s not an easy trade).

In case you hadn’t noticed, the uncommon has almost always passed for standard fare chez moi. We’ve had a coffin for a living room coffee table. Dad has always lived in the barn. My brother would sleep on his bedroom balcony in the wintertime. Our garden tomatoes are sliced on the kitchen counter next to 2 x 4s that take over the kitchen because it is raining outside. Typical. So of course I accepted without pause that my retired father’s next mission was to build a lighthouse. He’s one of those people who just does stuff (quite successfully) without first stopping to ask whether he can, or should do it in the first place. 

So yesterday I am at work, enjoying some of the remaining internet in Senegal (yes, the former colony learned how strike from the French). Into my e-mail box pops the above text message from my brother’s cell phone. Excellent, I think to myself, Dad’s latest project is finally coming to completion.

Days like these, I really hate being away from home- but I can’t complain too much. I remember that as little as seventeen years ago, I was tied to life in America only through expensive phone calls and the occasional hand written letter. I don’t even wanna think about how bad things were for people living waaay back in the super olden days.  

Another pic from 2008. I like this photo a lot because it is captures tradition being passed down right before your eyes.

So, now that the world enjoys fantastic wastes of time such as Facebook and text messaging, I’d like to share some of the photos that my brother recorded and posted for everyone to see.  I don’t think that everyone who isn’t a Hallinan appreciates how much he does for my family. He may be the youngest, and he may be the last one at home, but that doesn’t mean he’s not the glue holding everyone and everything together. He’s pretty amazing, and he does more than his fair share of the workload without drawing attention to this fact. It doesn’t matter; he’s got four crazy sisters who can (and will) do this for him.

Enjoy: 

Here we go!

John. On duty.
NOW it’s starting to look like a lighthouse!
Hello treeline. I think the seaman’s eye should be able to make out the ocean…but I’ll need to confirm in December.
Well of course, the glass came from the Falmouth Ice Arena…
See Dad? He’s standing next to the anthill.
People are usually surprised when I announce that Dad is in his 70s. You’re only as old as you feel, and this shot is proof that you can look like a teenager at any age.

Great job lads! I am incredibly eager to get home and climb to the top of this new triumph….this time using a normal ladder…if you can call a spiral staircase leading up to a lighthouse that is not sitting by the ocean normal. I certainly do.

Postscript:

Knowing that the crane would be at the Hatchville Shipyard in a matter of days, I paid my father a quick phone call earlier in the week:

“Hello?” He asks, fielding another random phone call from one of his daughters.
“Question for ya.” I start right in- we usually dispense with pleasantries.
“Yuh?” He asks, ready for just about anything.
“After the top goes on this lighthouse, what’s next on your list of things to do?”

He laughs. I know he’s got a zillion more ideas crammed up in his brain. I just want him to maybe start picking projects that don’t take this retired airline pilot too far off the ground.

I’m a lucky daughter.