JUST BACK FROM:
I HAVEN’T TALKED to Aunt Patti in several years, not since Granny, her sister, began suffering severely from the effects of Alzheimer’s disease and consequently forgot who most of us were. Growing up, I saw her only when she stopped by
Tulsa,
Oklahoma, for a day or two and visited Granny; she always demanded beans and corn bread for dinner because they reminded her of home. Otherwise, I came to know her mostly through Granny’s memories. That’s not surprising, though, because Aunt Patti, better known as Patti Page, the Singing Rage -- one of the best-selling artists in music history -- was a busy girl.
Ever since I moved away and became a writer, I’ve actually seen Aunt Patti and talked to her more often -- interviewing her about career milestones and catching clips of her on cable television (every time the movie
Elmer Gantry comes on, for example). But she’s always been with me. Her songs were often on the record player when I was growing up. I think I knew the words to “Mockin’ Bird Hill” before I knew the words to any
Van Halen song. And when the songs were not playing on the record player, Granny would hum them while she did housework. Granny and her sister
Virginia would sing with Aunt Patti at weddings when Aunt Patti was starting out, and once, they sang with her on
The Mike Douglas Show in the 1960s. One of Granny’s (and Patti’s) favorites was “Old Cape Cod.” The first lines come to me still, at odd moments during the day, at least once a week: “If you’re fond of sand dunes and salty air/Quaint little villages here and there/You’re sure to fall in love with old Cape Cod.”
I think of this as I order lobster stew from Jake Rooney’s, a local favorite in Harwich Port,
Massachusetts, on a clear day in the Middle Cape. The waitress smiles as she brings it to me. “This is my favorite,” she says. I nod and savor the lobster meat, which has been sautéed in butter, and the sherry cream broth. I talk to the patrons as we watch sports on the TV. That’s when my sin hits me: I’ve stopped at a place without a view of the sea.
This just won’t do. I’ve come to the
curling peninsula of eastern Massachusetts that surrounds Cape Code Bay to experience the Cape myself, to see if its small-town seaside charm matches the ethereal quality of Aunt Patti’s tune: “If you like the taste of a lobster stew/Served by a window with an ocean view/You’re sure to fall in love with old Cape Cod.”