MR. LEVIT, AND THE TAMALE FAMILY.

Yesterday TLW (The Little Woman) and I went to the Stony Brook Museum to view the Arthur Levit and his Levittown exhibition. It was a nice inside look at the development of low cost housing for the returning GI’s of WWII, the big one.

Being how the museum is small the house was packed, I had to find a parking place, and after driving around for awhile, the security guard told us to park right in front of the building, in a “No Parking” area. We exited the car, and entered the building when the guard noticed that a family was leaving as they were heading for their car.

Running out to the car, I jumped in and followed the family to their car, waiting as the family assembled in front of this powder blue1987 station wagon, with Mr. Tamale driving, Mrs. Tamale on the other side of the car, waiting to get in were Grandma and Grandpa Tamale, and Chico Tamale the 8 year old, along with sister Conchita the youngest Tamale.

Grandpa Tamale positioned himself about 15 feet from the rear of the car as Papa Tamale cranked up the old Ford as it puttered and whined in the gloam of evening, putting out little smoke puffs and then a bang. Grandpa would be the guiding light for Mr. Tamale when he decided to back out. Momma Tamale was now sitting next to Papa, waving her hands and probably yelling at one of the Tamale family members. Little junior Tamale would not get into the Tamale wagon until Grandma Tamale got in, since Chico probably wanted the window seat, but had to yet deal with Grandpa Tamale.

There is nothing worst than a mess of Tamale’s jockeying for position in the Tamale cart!

It was now going on ten minutes of waiting when I figured out that perhaps the Tamale Clan was not going to move for fear that I would be with the Department of Immigration and would ask for their “green card.”

Mr. Tamale must have thought: “Ha, the Gringo he thinks can fool me! I, Miguel Zapata Tamale will not get deported, I will make camp here in parking lot uno, the new home of la familia de Tamale.”

I must admit, the “Stony Brook” sounding address has a nice ring to it.