There is never a dull moment in the Leone household, and even a death in the family does not seem to eliminate the rest of the drama that surrounds our little homestead.
As mentioned in an earlier post, we traveled back to Wisconsin on Friday night after Grandma's passing. Emotionally drained and physically exhausted, we crawled into bed without packing just as soon as we arrived home that evening.
The next morning, we hustled about, preparing to get Kathleen off to her Sonatina Festival, while simultaneously re-packing suitcases—this time for Grandma's wake and funeral.
As we zipped around the house in something of a frenzy, we heard a horrible sound outside. Seconds later, I hear Joe shouting that a hawk is killing one of his chickens. Sure enough, there is a bloody battle ensuing, and big, determined hawk is putting his finishing touches on one of our chickens. [Sigh. As if we haven't had enough sadness and drama in the last few days.]
Joe runs outside to try to save his chicken, but it's much too late. The sight of Joe carrying off his dead chicken to its resting place is a bit much after the he just said goodbye to his mother. Seconds later, I hear his frustrated shout from the coop,
"All the chickens are gone! Every last one of them."
An empty coop. The hawks flew off with all our chickens while we were spending time with Grandma.
The kids seem less concerned than we do about the passing of the chickens, so they go out to play. Moments later, we hear William shouting. He's been playing in the prairie grass surrounding our property, and he just stepped on another chicken.
And it's alive!
Suddenly, he's finding more chickens!
And more chickens.
One by one, William uncovers terrified chickens, huddled in the tall grass, hiding from the hawks. Every one of our chickens, save the one the hawk killed before our eyes, is alive! It feels nothing short of a miracle on a very strange, very melancholy day.
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| Old summer photo of our chickens. |
No sooner has everyone come inside to rejoice in the return of the chickens feared-dead, than we hear Anna Marie shouting from the basement,
"Who took my snakes?"
"What do you mean who took your snakes?"
"Who took my snakes? They are not in their case!"
You are kidding me! We have a hawk killing our chickens [well, chicken-singular, as it turns out], and now we have snakes loose for who-knows-how-long in the basement? You'll recall,
I've never been a fan of the snakes-in-my-house idea.
Joe's words make my stomach turn when he opines that the snakes will seek a warm spot—most likely nestled in our insulation or perhaps in our furnace or in some small space in our walls. I think I'll be sick.
Joe and Anna Marie begin to search the basement, trying to find any small spaces where the snakes might be residing. I can't bring myself to go down there and help them. I'm just thinking about how I don't want to ever use the treadmill again, for fear that a snake will be living under it and find it's way up to me as I start running. [shudder] Besides, I need to get Kathleen ready to head out for her competition.
I am trying to shut out the frantic sounds of the snake-search (including paternal scolding for not securing the snake abode) on the floor below, when I hear excited screams.
"We found one!"
"You found one? No way!"
"Yep, we found it."
Unbelievable. Hidden between an old trunk and the wall. That's one less snake I have to worry about.
To improve matters further, Anna Marie realizes, upon re-playing the events of the last few days, that the snake she found among the potatoes in the basement the week before (and promptly threw outside at my direct order) was her other, younger pet snake. At the time, she hadn't realized her snakes were missing, and we assumed the outside had come inside with Joe's potato harvest.
While of course there is nothing that compares to Joe's mother's death, I must say that the events of Thursday-Friday-Saturday, including chicken death (followed by chicken resurrection) and snake escapes (followed by surprising snake recovery), felt like an surreal roller coaster. We rush to Chicago on Thursday, Joe's mom passes on Friday morning, we drive home in mourning on Friday night, we get up on Saturday and find hawks have eaten our chickens and Anna Marie's snakes are escaped into our basement, we then find that all but one of the chickens are alive, we find the escaped snake, we take Kathleen to her sonatina competition where she plays like the wind, and we receive a call that afternoon that Kathleen has beat out all the competition and won her event. It felt a bit like we were living in a made-for-TV movie with the ups and the downs and the extreme emotions of those days.
I tell you, there is NEVER a dull moment in this house. Never. The kids want a dog. I'm not sure we need to add more excitement to our existence.
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| Current photo of snake and its habitat. Note the well-placed blocks atop the terrarium. The arrangement doesn't make me perfectly satisfied, but it pleases Anna Marie immensely. |
Carolyn Jane Leone Carolyn Jane Leone (nee Maderer) was the beloved wife of the late Louis B. Leone, M.D.; loving mother of Louis M. Leone, George J. (Cherryl, nee Kelly) Leone, Dr. Catherine L. (and Jeff Brown) Leone, John F. Leone, the late James T. Leone, William J. (Jennifer Krentz) Leone, Margaret L. (Anthony) Rosano, Paul F. Leone, Joseph T. (Elizabeth, nee Latham) Leone and Carolyn A. Leone; devoted grandmother of Helen (Chris Shanahan) Shoemaker, James Shoemaker, Rosemary Leone, Callie Leone, Zoe Leone, Margaret Leone, Madeline Leone, Anna Marie Leone, Kathleen Leone, William Leone, Andrew Leone, Therese Leone, Marguerite Leone, and Jack L. Smith; cherished great-grandmother of Phineas Shanahan; fond sister of the late George Willard Maderer; dear sister-in-law of Catherine (Theodore) Kay. Visitation is 2 to 8 p.m. Sunday at Friedrichs Funeral Home, 320 W. Central Road (at Northwest Highway), Mount Prospect. She will lie in state 9 a.m. until Mass at 10 a.m. Monday, at St. Raymond de Penafort Church, Elmhurst Road (Route 83) at Lincoln Street, Mount Prospect. Interment will be in Queen of Heaven cemetery. Carolyn Jane Maderer was born Sept. 24, 1924, in Elgin, Ill. She grew up with her parents and brother on a dairy farm in Hampshire that had been homesteaded by her great-grandfather. She attended the Bean School, a one-room schoolhouse and graduated from Hampshire High School. At the age of 16 she won a scholarship to the University of Illinois-Champaign, when female students interested in chemistry studied in the College of Home Economics. She studied nutrition and graduated in 1944. In 1946, she married college sweetheart Louis B. Leone, M.D., after he had completed medical school and she had finished an internship as a nutritionist. They settled briefly in Chicago; Louis was deployed by the Army to Panama. Carolyn followed shortly with their first two sons. Returning to civilian life, they lived in Chicago, then moved with their growing family to Skokie, where they were active in St. Lambert's Parish. In 1961 they moved to Mount Prospect, where Carolyn had lived with her family for the last 49 years. Here, Louis's career at Northwest Community Hospital anchored the family which grew to nine children while Louis was delivering lots of other families' babies. Through the moves and the cheerful support of her husband's career, Carolyn made a life full of love and care for her children - and lots of other children and organizations, too. She was active in St. Raymond's Parish and the broader community. Over the years she was involved in Cub Scouts, Girl Scouts, and any activities the local schools could dream up for her kids. She spent much of her time shepherding her children to lessons, recitals, meetings, sports events, plays, parades and concerts. She enjoyed playing bridge in the neighborhood and bowled in a women's league for many years. She was a member of St. Ray's Woman's Club, taught CCD classes, and participated in bible study classes. She and Louis shared a love of music and were longtime patrons of the Lyric Opera in Chicago. Carolyn was a member of the Northwest Chapter of the Lyric Opera Guild for many years, serving in time as its treasurer and president. Carolyn and Louis enjoyed traveling to many parts of the world. Carolyn was grateful, and maybe a little surprised, at all the wonderful blessings and experiences that came into her life. She passed away at home, Nov. 19, 2010, at home in Mount Prospect, as was her wish, surrounded by many of her loving family. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to the Greater Chicago Food Depository, 4100 W. Ann Lurie Place, Chicago IL 60632, 773-247-3663,
