So, Saturday morning, P, his niece and I were scheduled to go visit the Pate Museum in nearby Benbrook. The non-profit museum has been operational for 40 years and due to financial issues, it will be closing on December 24th of this month. Since P had fond childhood memories of the place, he wanted to pay his last respects as well as share it with his niece, whom had never been there.
P calls me early Saturday morning and we make plans to meet at my house around 11 (I’d packed a picnic the night before and we were going to eat at a nearby park for lunch). P calls back a little later and says that his mom confided in him that his father also wanted to go, but didn’t want to ask, so he asked me if it would be alright if he went with us. I said “Of course!” and was happy that I packed a “backup sandwich” (in case someone didn’t want what I made for them and/or anyone wanted more than one). They all arrived around 11 and I gave them a brief tour of my house (thank god it was clean; like they say, you only get one chance to make a good first impression) before we hit the road. We went in my car, but I let P drive, since he knew where we were going.
We arrived about an hour or so later and there were A LOT of people there. The place was packed! It was kind of bittersweet: it was great that so many people wanted to come out and pay their final respects, but on the other hand, it’s a shame that the museum didn’t have this kind of patronage when it really needed it.
After looking around and taking a lot of pictures, we were off to the park to have lunch. It was a beautiful day, just the right combination of sunshine and cool breezes. P’s dad regaled us with stories of P as a (neurotic) kid. LOL! Poor, sweet, little P. It was a lot of fun and P’s dad confided in him later that the picnic couldn’t have been more perfect. Nice. 
If you’d like to see the (non-traditional) photos I took while we were there, click here.
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