Spring is coming

Pop used to begin his letters around this time of the year with "the days are getting longer; spring is coming."

The snowstorm we got, which some of you also got and some of you drove and rode through, demonstrated we are a long way from spring.  And happily so. Come March, we may not be so happy with the snow.  For now, though, it's our first sizable snowfall, although the little sprinkling we had on Christmas eve meant we had a white, Currier and Ives day. 

So, Merry Christmas.  Since we're only up to the 5 golden rings, I think I can still wish you all a Merry Christmas.  

Here's a game, for the photo we included.  How many items in the photo can you identify which you also saw in Pomfret.  Items, not people.

We thought of Pomfret yesterday, on Joe's birthday, remembering his birthdays in the years we all used to congregate in the week between Christmas and New Years.  Fun.  These days, all I can think of is the mess we created.  I am not sure how Grandma and Pop put up with the chaos, but it sure was fun.  And, while we're not together this week, we will be next week in Fairport, for Matthew and Tina's wedding.  More fun.

And, we had fun this Christmas, and hope you did as well.  It was planes, trains and automobiles, coming home for the next generation.  Joe was first to arrive, on the train from NYC, which he barely managed to get following a delayed bus ride up from DC.  Margaret and Andrew came by car the following day, and then Annie on Christmas eve.  Annie had arrived a couple of days earlier by plane from China, but spent her first day decompressing in NYC with Greg's family before getting the train north.  When they all left, it was a sequel to the arrival, but with the snow a lot more frantic.

Surely there were more stories than transportation?  Yes, John and Marilyn joined us for Christmas eve dinner; we ate way more cookies, English muffins and cinnabuns (thank you) than we should have; caught up on job and grad school developments; played Sequence; did a jigsaw puzzle (or started it) and crossword puzzles; opened wonderful presents (thank you!!); gave up being vegan and had bacon and prime rib; went for walks and to the gym (not enough); listened to John Denver and the Muppet Christmas songs; watched the kitty and D sort out their territory, eventually; and, went to Christmas eve mass.  i imagine there were similar scenes in your homes.

Some news:  Claire got into Hope College, yet another one.  She will have a tough decision.

Share your Christmas photo by attaching it to an e-mail and sending it to: popsweeklyletter.dickson@blogger.com.  Better than Facebook and Twitter!

Love from over here, and see you next week!       

'Twas the week before Christmas

All the papers turned in, the presentations completed and the books put away!  Yipee!  I remember how it feels; right Sean, right Margaret?  Niiice.

Mary and I spent the last of the semester in NYC, as my final assignment was participation in the Guantanamo Public Memory Project which opened an exhibit at NYU on Thursday night. Anyone interested in seeing the exhibit in the windows of the Kimmel Center near Washington Square will notice that UMass did the panel Where is Guantanamo?  At the two-day conference accompanying the exhibit opening, we heard some incredible testimonials from soldiers, Cuban refugees, children who grew up on the base, lawyers, etc.  

While in NYC, we went to see the show "Warhorse" which featured some pretty incredible mechanical, puppet horses and a wonderful story; we also went up and down 5th Avenue about a hundred times and then stopped at the Cloisters on our way out, on a lark.  Quite a lark.  We had seen the sign dozens of times before, Joe had told us to go dozens of times before.  And it was worth the stop, to see the medieval religious art and architecture, which was brought over for this museum in the early 1900s.  Nobody could think of doing that now, but the Rockefellers were able to 100 years ago.

We were also made acutely aware of a pattern in our lives, of hearing about tragedy while we are away from home.  Terrible news from the school in Connecticut hit home since it was such a quiet town, since we all know teachers like the ones there, since as parents and brothers and sisters, we can all relate to the instant loss of such young, innocent children.  Sad, and angry as well about our inability to focus on our gun problem.

Anyway, since it have been quite a while since we last wrote, we have a lot of news:

Joe has come back from and gone to Kosovo on a business trip related to an assistance project; Margaret finished up one job last Friday and starts her new job at the State Department tomorrow; Annie has applied to three grad schools for next fall.

Just as Janet gets back on her feet, Peter has had some real issues with his knee, in terms that sound like a football injury.  He also had some pretty serious dental work this past week.

Claire keeps getting into the colleges she applies to, but wants to apply to a few more.  Oxford?  MIT?  Andrew has a couple of intestinal procedures this week.

We got a wedding invitation!  A fun one from Matthew and Tina.  Two, even.  One for Annie.  We noticed just in time there was an RSVP and said YES,  Looking forward to seeing everyone in early January.

Since we last wrote, we also hustled down to DC to attend a friend's 60th birthday party and drop in on Margaret and Andrew (Joe had just left for Kosovo.)  Short but wonderful.  

And we have a story, a This American Life story, where Mary was able to knock off at least a couple of her 15 minutes of fame, with her exchange with Ira Glass in front of 700 people at his talk on radio in Troy New York.  During question time, Mary asked him what she should do if she had a story worthy of This American Life.  He could have easily just dismissed her with a "Go to our website" line, but I think Ira sensed he had a possible story for the audience.  He asked Mary what it was and she said "It's a story about a con man whose son cons his father, the con man.  The only problem is, I'm not supposed to know the story."  No hesitation, or nervousness, mumbling, or confusion.  Ira responded: "I want to hear that story.  Give me your e-mail."  Mary did hesitate at that, in front of 700 people, so Ira gave her his e-mail.  When she wrote the next day, he responded, with encouragement and sensitivity.  Mary's following up to get the story to the program.  Stay tuned to see if there's a second act.

And also, we saw John and Marilyn's grandchildren, Hayley and Natalie at the show as well.  So there are witnesses, from family.

So, today, we catch up on Christmas preparations.  First, we get a tree.  

And you?  Hope you're all well.  Love from over here. 

'tis the season!

Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday and now Mobile Tuesday.  Coming our way soon - I-Wednesday (where you buy for yourself) and Virtual Thursday (where you pretend to buy but you ran out of money).  Tweeting all the time, of course.

Back to Thanksgiving, after a little opening rant.  We had a wonderful one, and hope you did too.  Our brainy idea was to go back to the DC area for the holiday, sparing Joe and Margaret the headache of holiday travel, since we had more flexibility in our schedules.  And, that actually proved true, since we encountered very little problems on the road - in fact, I made it down to DC on Wednesday morning in record time, pulling up to Mary's old school by noon.  Don't ask when I started.

The only challenge with our plan was:  where to stay and where to have the big meal.  Details.  Both Joe and Margaret extended generous and welcome offers of hospitality, but Mary backed into an invitation from Gerry, her friend from the 1970s and Annie's godmother for both a bunk and a meal for all of us!  So, off to the races.  

Mary went down by plane on Monday, to connect with her Peru friends and with her old school colleagues and students.  I joined a couple days later and we had a traditional pre-Thanksgiving dinner in Chinatown with Joe, Margaret and Andrew.

 Traditions have to start somewhere.  We had a terrific Thursday with everyone pitching in to prepare, purchase, arrange etc. for the meal.  Annie called during the meal, and we all shouted into the speaker phone at once.  And, the football on TV was even good!  Go Pats.

Friday, we got an insider's tour of the Treasury Department from Joe (very impressive) and met up with Margaret and Andrew for the new Bond movie (fun).  In between, we joined our Peace Corps friends in town at the only bar in central DC that was open (also fun).  

It was only a few days later that we received the really big news for the family, from a different kind of season.  CLAIRE GOT INTO COLLEGE!   She received two acceptances, from Ripon and from Knox.  With even a nice chunk of scholarship money.  Way to go!  She is still applying to a bunch of other colleges, so we expect her list of acceptances to grow.  Other news from Dundee is that Daniel made the freshman basketball team, and is on pace to become the tallest Dickson ever!

Other Thanksgiving nuggets we picked up:  Jeffrey and Melodie braved the traffic to go to Fairport and joined Matthew, Tina and Oliver and Tina's parents for Thanksgiving at David and Paula's.  Andrew and Lur had the Knaak gang over.  And Annie was going to have Thanksgiving on Sunday with her friends.  Dannie went out to Denver to spend Thanksgiving with Patrick, who was in a local theater production!  And, we saw a couple of photos of John and Marilyn's Thanksgiving with their whole gang!  

We spoke to Annie a few times, and she is in the process of applying to grad schools, in New York and Boston. She's hoping to leave Beijing in her final few months and go to the province of Yunnan and get a different China experience.  Maybe teach English to get a little cash as well.

The weekend before Thanksgiving, Mary's niece Maura and her two-year old daughter Elsie descended on us.  Oh how we forget the gear and the food and the energy of young children.  Elsie's a cutie, who loved our kitty, but it was unrequited love.  Our kitty didn't love being chased around HIS house so much.

And, the weekend before that we headed to Princeton to check in on Peter and Janet.  Janet was in the early days without her cast and was just starting to put full weight on her leg.  She's doing well.  We got a first-hand glimpse of the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, an hour's drive from the shore.  Debris that people had been cleaning up were lining the streets of Princeton; just down the road from Peter and Janet's house dozens of trees had come down.

Mary and I then went to Philadelphia to meet up with a friend from Peace Corps who lives in Hawaii, and we did the historic tour of central Philadelphia.  It's a worthwhile visit.  

This weekend, we actually are home.  Phew.  But not next weekend or the week after.  Back to DC and then to New York.  Frequent driving miles?  

Mary has started tutoring an adult man who never learned to read and can't really write his own name.  I am in the final throes of the semester, which means two big papers and a bunch of other things.  Churning them out.  

With all this news we have a couple of photos.

And we're off to December.  Love from over here! 

Happy Thanksgiving

> We're down in the nation's capital for Thanksgiving and last weekend we were in 2 of our former capitals.

> Have a wonderful family, turkey, football, parade day. Love

Oh, and ...

I returned the wheelchair today!

THANK YOU!

This is a big thank you.  Through all our trials and tribulations you have called and emailed to offer your emotional support and encouragement and sometimes much more.  It means a great deal to both of us.  In my professional capacity as a lawyer, I get to see families at their worst; some have more than a passing resemblance to our background and social setting, but somehow they just turned out very differently than we did.  We have many many things to thank Mom and Pop for, but I think this sense of being centered and cohesive is the best.  It's all the more remarkable considering their own fractured, perhaps even Gothic, family histories.  But thank you so much for all the calls and emails and other help.

Janet is certainly on the mend and making very good progress and working very hard at it.  Her doctor was rather surprised that she went back to work so quickly, since apparently most people just stay home.  She is now helping out with many of the chores, and we (I?) are looking forward to more of that.

My overwhelming sense of the whole episode is one of a big blank space in our lives.  All the things that we could normally do we couldn't.  No matter how "accessible" some place might be, the accommodations are usually second rate and it takes longer to get to them.  So you're just forced to stay at home.  I don't mean that there haven't been many positives, because there have been (see first and second paragraphs), but you just have to forego or put on hold so many things.  The effective loss of my law partner since July and still ongoing hasn't helped at all, and his sense of doom and depression about his situation is a pretty strong contrast to Janet's grit.

In the midst of all this, or actually towards the end, we got Sandied.  That upsets things, too: if we have no power, we have nothing: no heat, water, hot water, very limited septic (a pump pushes stuff out to the septic field), and (for me) worst of all, no television or internet.  That really hurts for news junkies like me, and it was interesting to learn that this is what I missed the most.  Mom and Pop's old generator powered our sump pump and fridge, and a lamp or two and the microwave when we needed it, and I did buy a very small capacity heater the last day we had no power and it could operate as well.  So it's an old machine and drinks about five or more gallons of gas a day, but it works.  The sense of disruption is complete: I had to spend three hours one day just to get more gas for the generator (it actually went out while I was gone).  Still today there are roads closed, so you never know if you can get where you're going.  Lots of stores were closed for a long time, courts were closed all week, schools were closed,   We didn't get hammered anywhere near as badly as many, many others, but boy, I do not ever want to go through this again.

It's been a time of reflection.  I've learned I still fall very short in the patience department, and I'd better get that fixed for the years to come.  But I've also appreciated how much we all care about each other.  That wasn't in any doubt, but it helped us get through it all.

Winter

It's a little early.  We have a fire in the fireplace and a fair amount of smoke smell throughout the house.  Hmm.  Grandma wouldn't like it. 

Our first snowstorm has begun, although it's mostly flurries right now.  The temperatures are certainly winter-like.  Mary, we're not in Maryland any more!

It was cold yesterday for voting as well.  Fortunately, there were plenty of voting stations in Pittsfield so there were no lines, early for Mary or late for me.  How about with you all?  Heard around Amherst there were two hour waits.  Committed.

Of course, we stayed up late, and we know via Twitter and text messaging a number of you all did as well.  Peter, Janet and Johanna were up for the weekend and the elections took up a lot of our conversation.  Peter was reading a book by Nate Silver, a NYT pollster, who was supremely confident in his predictions.  I repeated that confidence at the university yesterday and people thought I was nuts.  Turns out Nate Silver was accurate.

The best news is I will be getting fewer e-mails.  I did forward one which I got from Barack shortly after 11pm.  He graciously thanked me for my help....and then asked for money!!

The bigger news though may have been that Peter and Janet got power back.  We felt so bad for them as they were leaving on Sunday, not knowing if they were going back to a house without power.  And, when they walked in the door, they had no power.  It did come back on later that night.

We had a nice weekend with them.  Janet is cast-less, and on the long road to recovery.  She is religious about her exercises, and we saw her even take a few steps.  

The girls went to Great Barrington and the boys went for a walk in the woods.  We watched a movie about Marilyn Monroe, which was actually better than we all thought.  We listened to the Princeton football game, which we narrowly lost on some bad calls at the end of the game.  They always seem to go against us.

Earlier in the week, John and Marilyn came over as they were without power.  They watched us have dinner and then we saw the news together/  By the time they got home, their power had been restored.

Other news: Mary is getting over a long, bad, lingering cold.  She seems to be finally on the mend.  We watched a little of another big college game, which we know Joe was also taking in: Alabama-LSU.  Margaret and Andrew were "Back to the Future" for Halloween.  (We didn't have any trick-or-treaters, but we fortunately had only bought a few small bags to eat on our own.)

Mary joined me at UMass last week for a lecture on the Greensboro NC truth and reconciliation process.  We were unaware of KKK shootings there in 1979, where perpetrators were aquitted even though there was video of them shooting.  One of the survivors was there, and was still severely disabled.  And understandably bitter and vengeful.

We think Annie had a GRE test about now.  Hope it went well.  Love from up here.

And hope you all are well.  

 

Frankenstorm

I just got an e-mail saying the University of Massachusetts was closed tomorrow, so instead of last minute homework, I can write the weekly letter.  And it's overdue.

 

The storm was also responsible for Mary cancelling her trip to DC this week.  She was supposed to leave Tuesday; she thought about leaving today, but it just didn't sound right:  "I'm going to drive into a hurricane."  She said she would have done it if she was 24, but she's a different age and has no excuse for being recklessly foolish.

 

We did take advantage of the day to put things away for the winter.  And, of course, we had an e-mail forwarded to us from a friend in DC who said there was a run on organic no-fat milk at Whole Foods.  Sounds like a state of emergency.  Are we the greatest generation or what?  Maybe the second greatest.

 

Hey! We have a driveway, and we have parked the cars in the garage!  Take that Sandy.  Johnny came over to help put up some braces so we can hang the canoe on the wall.   And, we painted the wallboard and hung some hooks so we are a little bit organized with garden tools.  How long will that last.

 

We have spent the week negotiating the construction on Hancock Rd, where they are laying new gas pipes. 

 

We went to Boston last week, and this week Boston came to us.  Mary had a rug-braiding course near Woburn (remember Grandma's 70th?) so we made a weekend of it, visiting our friends Cliff and Sheila (whom we nromally see in Maine.)  Mary finished one braided pad for her computer and is busy at work on a rug.  This weekend was parents' weekend at Williams, so Charlie and family (one of whom lives in Boston) came. 

 

Next weekend, we hope Peter and Janet will be here, having survived Sandy.  We see Janet's postings on Facebook about getting around, although it sounded like Johanna was pushing her through NYC in a wheelchair.  Can't expect anyone to negotiate the city after a broken leg.  Hope recovery is going quickly.

 

There's a rumor out there that Claire had a party in Chicago with her friends from school, as part of her 18th birthday present.  And Bill turned 30!  What happened there?  Congratulations.

 

David says that wedding preparations are proceeding.  They tried out a restaurant for the rehearsal dinner.  Looking forward to it.  Annie is making her flight plans!

 

Anyone following the election?  Mary is.  She picked out a line in the third debate out teachers unions and wrote a letter to the editor in the Berkshire Eagle about it:  http://www.berkshireeagle.com/letters/ci_21858392/romney-likes-his-teachers-poor.  Take that!  We saw her swim coach at the movies Friday, and he had seen it!  She's started wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap when she goes out.

 

We spoke with Joe a few times.  He sounds busy, but still has time for college football.  Not sure that he had time for that last year.

 

Halloween is coming up.  We saw pictures of Margaret and Andrew dressed in "Back to the Future" garb.  Very convincing.

 

Have a wonderful week; stay smart and safe.  Love from up here. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is no joy in Mudville

Sorry about the Nationals and the Reds.

Celebrate!

We have much to celebrate.  First off, a lot of birthdays.  Belated to Paula and Johanna.  Upcoming to Janet, Claire, Billy and Kathleen!  And there is a first wedding anniversary also thrown in there.  Remember that weekend, Jeff and Melodie?  Fun.  Anyway, we hope everyone is marking their day in style, especially Claire who is turning 18, and will be able to vote!

 

Another reason for celebrating is Janet had her cast off this past Monday.  What a long haul.  I bet there's still a lot more to come, but you made it!

 

Wait, there's still more.  David and Paula celebrated with a trip to the outer banks of North Carolina last week. And, Annie (and Greg) returned from a vacation in Burma, not Myanmar, which we learned is the military term for the country.  Annie sent pictures, and it looks like a magical place.  Hope to read her blog soon.

 

We celebrated Columbus Day with Margaret and Andrew and D up here for a few days.  We did a Pittsfield arts walk one night, and then went to a concert at the Guthrie Center.  The chief reason for the trip was to check out the kitty, and to introduce D to the cat.  That did not go as well as we thought it might.  Seems the kitty has become a little territorial in her brief time with us.  She was back happily running around the house as soon as D left, though.

 

Mary spent a couple days over at UMass with me, and found the apartment she rented when she went to college.  It's right on the railroad tracks, and looks like a college pad.  We also did a tour of the Steepletop, Edna St. Vincent Millay's home in NY, which is worth a trip.  This famous poet died in 1950, and her sister took over the house, leaving it pretty much untouched from the day she died.  Needless to say, her quirkiness, which coexisted with her intellect, is evident pretty much everywhere on this country estate/compound.  Not as grand as Edith Wharton's mansion, but beautiful nonetheless.

 

We spoke with Andrew who said that Lur's father had a stroke or series of small strokes.  He spent a while in the hospital, and doesn't sound like he's doing very well.  Tough on the whole family.

 

We remain busy with house projects.  We finished a landscaping exercise, and turned our attention to getting the garage ready, which means taping and then painting the dryboard.  The driveway guys were supposed to start today, but we think the rain kept them from coming.  Maybe tomorrow.  It would be a real breakthrough if we could park the cars in the garage by first frost!

Joe has been busy as well; we talked to him as he was going to work on Sunday evening at 7pm.  His comment was: "That's why they have young people working."

Mary has substitute-taught a few times, but for several reasons that remains less than satisfying.  I am frantically trying to stay caught up at UMass, and so far, so good.  There's so much extra (films, conferences, beer parties) that I miss by not being on campus, but I like being home too.

Hope you do too!  Love from down here and congratulations to all the celebrating folks!  

October!

September is history! Pun intended.   At least it has been for me.  Adjusting to a new routine with lots of history reading and papers and stress and intellectual stimulation.

But it is not all about me.  Can you believe how fast these last 4 weeks have gone by?  The month started, and we were outside working and playing and swimming, and now we have the heat on, and fires in the fireplace.  This weekend, we started shutting down the summer, moving the grill into the garage and perhaps putting away the lawn mowers.  Time marches on.

The photo is another sign of mourning.  It was Peter's last jar of Mom's chili sauce, which we enjoyed last week end when Mary and I headed down to NJ to check in on the recuperating Janet and her live-in caregiver, Peter!  We had burgers and cleaned out the chile sauce, and Peter found a couple of store bought replacements we will have to use.

Janet is (and has been) surprisingly upbeat about her leg and loss of mobility.  She's going to work, to the theater (a cast party!), to stores and restaurants.  It's a lot of work for her but it is admirable all she is doing.  We helped do household chores, and enjoyed lots of conversation about the election and school and jobs. Peter and I went to a soccer game and we watched "The Hunger Games."  Johanna was arriving the day we left, so more help was coming.  She and Sean and a former student of Peter's had gone Saturday night to see Bruce Springsteen at the Meadowlands.  Or whatever it's called these days.  And, prior to that Johanna had spent the week on Martha's Vineyard, at Janie's house.

Mary came back and got a call for substitute teaching, which she did twice this week.  A start.  She came to Northampton one night as I had to stay over, and she checked out her old college haunts,including her old rental, just steps away from the railroad tracks.  Oh to be young.

She has been busy as well doing landscaping around the house, so we are filling in the beds near the foundation.  Hope the deer leave it alone.  Mary saw a wolf when she drove in the driveway one day, so maybe we won't need a dog to keep the deer away.  But, what would you rather have, a wolf or deer?  Or Little Red Riding Hood?

Annie was supposed to be going to Myanmar today for a brief vacation.  Wow.  She had looked into changing jobs, but then decided to stay where she was.  Margaret and Andrew had tickets last week to the Patriots game in Baltimore.  They made some new friends with wierdos with purple, spiky hair.  And Joe spent last weekend at Ann Arbor, where he saw a college football game.  He sounds busy at work.  Good.

This weekend, we had a houseful, with Marj and Lew, and Marj's mother here for the night.  Friends dropped by for birthday cake.  We think the big attraction is Bubbles, our new, very social kitty.  Two weekends ago, we had another houseful with friends of Mary's from her school in Maryland, and brother Dan, who came up for his high school reunion!  We love visitors!

The leaves are turning here, and we're almost at peak foliage.  The rain has made things a little dreary but what's not to love with the change of seasons.

Hope you all are well.  Love from up here.

 

Catching my breath

Wow.  Has life taken a turn.  For well over a year, I have talked about going back to school.  Researching, applying, interviewing, and planning.  Mostly gabbing and babbling on about it. I now have three classes under my belt, two papers written, four books and too many journal articles read.  I thought retirement was an adjustment.  The history is interesting, with a lot of variation, but the lifestyle is so far a little stressful.  Poor Mary.

Part of the adjustment is that I am now a Kindle guy.  I like not carrying around all the books and paper.  The verdict is still out if note-taking and finding stuff is easier.

Somewhat related to that, we took a day trip last week up to Fort Ticonderoga, making good on a long-awaited interest in seeing both Lake Champlain and this colonial fort which changed hands repeatedly between the Iroquois, the French, the British and the revolutionaries.  We spent more time in the gardens of the old residence/hotel adjoining the re-built fort. While in the fort museum, we found ourselves drawn to the maps showing Pittsfield (Pontoosuk) and the story of Col. John Brown, a Pittsfield resident who led a successful attack on the fort at the beginning of the Revolutionary War, but was killed in military action a year later.  I happened to read about this phenomenon of "personalizing" history in The Presence of the Past, one of the books I read for school.

But enough about me. How's Janet?  We see on Facebook lots of pictures; she's back at school (not sure how) and has lots of people signing her cast.  I think she's now half-way through,  What a long haul.  We spoke with Peter last weekend, and he said he spent the day doing laundry.  We plan on going to Princeton this coming weekend, so Peter anyway could catch the Springsteen concert.

Speaking of which, we got a text from Margaret at the DC Springsteen appearance.  Later we saw on Facebook Jeffrey was there too.  Did you see each other?  They both gushed over the four hours of entertainment.  

We had a long talk with Joe, who is settling into long hours at work.  He still has time for college football.  Do you miss grad school?  And Annie is contemplating a new job.

What else?  Did someone mention a cat?  Yes David did.  We settled on a name for our new boy cat, who we can't help calling "her."  Bubbles, in the tradition of naming pets after characters in the Wire; it's close enough to a dog we used to own, and of course, we will call her/him "Kitty" anyway.

John and Marilyn returned from their long trip out west, after a week with their entire family in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, they headed for Georgia, New Orleans, Houston (for the space center), Austin, Ft. Worth, Colorado, Mt. Rushmore and then home.  I probably missed a few spots, they took in a lot of territory and a lot of our country.

This weekend, we hosted Dan Boyle who was here for his high school reunion.  He joined a full house of two of Mary's former teacher colleagues who took a long weekend to come up and enjoy the Berkshires.  Fun.

It was a week of sadness as well, reading of the events in Libya and other countries in that region.  I did not know Chris Stevens, but I did recognize him, probably from seeing him in the hallways and cafeteria.  He sounded so much like he was doing the right thing, in reaching out to Libyans, and showing them the face of the country that we know, but they don't.

On that sad note, we sign off, with love from over here.  

Home to Fairport

As you have heard by now, we have returned for Fairport and to a very suspicious cat - where have they been? "I'm well fed, but where have my owners been, and gladly they didn't bring back any new "family members that I have to break in".

The quick version of the story of the trip is 8,199 miles, start to finish. Along the way, we saw all of the Great Lakes on the same trip, we crossed many rivers, including the Niagara, The Soo, the Mississippi, the Missouri, The Yellowstone, the Galatin, the Madison,the Powder and Platte Rivers, the Firehole River, the Frasier, The Columbia The Colorado,the Mississippi (again) the Ohio and more. We traveled in canyons and to mountain tops (12,400') to be exact),we saw rain forests, and deserts,we saw evidence of volcanic eruptions (My. St Helens) and earthquake landslides - on the Madison River. We met couples from Lancaster England to Canberra, Australia. We watched killer whales, bale eagles, ospreys, grizzlies and wolves,bison and elk;. You could say with some exceptions we saw wildlife ranging from Antelops to Zebras (yes zebras in a pasture along the interstate in Kansas. We visited some old Dickson family destinations, Elkhorn Ranch, Soldiers Chapel on the Galetin River,and Indian Hill and Indian Hill Church. As with any trip, there were highlights, times or locations that just stood out, and will become high on the memory list, before we begin to loose ours. Throughout the trip we both acknowledged that it was a trip that we should have done for you boys (Matthew and Jeffrey)years ago. It is a big and glorious country, not constrained by regional pettiness. It needs to be experienced. And, while we're glad to be back, be warned, we're thinking of our next trip.............

Winding down

Driving up to Vermont last week, we saw the tell-tale signs of summer ending: golden rod, cooler nights, glimmers of yellow on the occasional tree, tired,drooping leaves.  Sounds like me. 

 

We went to Vermont to visit the cabin of Charlie and Annie, which we had last visited in 1981.  Shortly after we got there (4 miles from the Canadian border), a couple of small, blond boys appeared from the cabin next to ours.  I remembered small blond-haired kids 30 years ago, and sure enough these were the children of the small boy and girl 31 years ago.  On the long drive home, we passed by Claremont, where we spent the first year of married life but didn't have the heart to go into town.  Nothing there for us, but bad memories of a tough teaching year.  We were familiar with the exits on highway 91, which we used to take to both Pittsfield and Pomfret for weekends.

 

On our minds up there were Peter and Janet who were toughing out their first couple of weeks of life with a broken leg.  Mary had initially gone down with them to help the transition.  Janet saw a doctor on Monday and got a cast, albeit a purple one, and a walker.  That seemed to help.  Peter set up their den to make moving around easier, and Janet was camped out in their first floor guest room.  Johanna came home after Mary left to help out.  We spoke to them last Friday night and they have survived their first week of a long ordeal.  Judging by her Facebook output, she is either bored or getting a little better.  Hope it's the latter, but I can understand if it's the former as well.  Peter's entry which follows has more details. 

 

We got nice photos from Margaret who had gone with Andrew and D to Chincoteague for a weekend of camping on the beach.  Looked like everyone was having fun, but especially D.  Andrew had been in Tampa for the run-up to the Republican convention and even had two by-lines in the paper last week.  And this weekend, Margaret's in Charlotte NC awaiting the opening of the Democratic convention.

 

We also got a few photos from David and Paula tracking their progress through Lake Louise, Jasper area of Alberta, Vancouver and now Oregon.  Paula wrote saying they were having a great time.  

We talked to Joe who tried his hand at cooking crabs last weekend, and was preparing for the opening of college football this weekend! 

 

Our garden just passed its peak.  We have had a good year for beans and cherry tomatoes.  The lettuce was not as full as last year, and we still can't get the hang of carrots.  The big, beefy tomatoes were being eaten by some critter right before they ripened, so I picked them when they were green.  And we have some green/orange/red tomatoes on our window sill.

 

This is my last week before classes start at UMass.  I have been going over there a couple of times a week to work with students applying for overseas scholarships.  I have received the course syllabi for the two courses I will be taking, and there's a lot of reading.  I have started, and the material is very interesting, but there's a lot of it.  I got the jitters.  Margaret mentioned she has also signed up for a class at GWU.

 

We know Annie had a long weekend of vacation down in Hong Kong last week.  She sent us a photo with her new computer.  Speaking of which, I broke down and got a Kindle.  Now I just have to figure out how it works. 

Out in Dundee we hear that Claire is captain of her volleyball team, has a new oboe.  Daniel is sitting out football season in anticipation of basketball.  What happened to soccer?  .

 

What else?  We saw Woody Allen's new movie (not as good as Midnight in Paris), we had a mini-Peace Corps reunion as the director from Gabon was vacationing at Jiminy Peak, and we got a kitten!  

Love from over here. 

 

The New Normal (temporary, but it sure doesn't feel like that now)

We're getting a little used to our new life.  Part of it hasn't changed: my law partner has been suffering from serious neck problems for a while, and has been AWOL for going on three months now.  He had serious surgery a month ago and is rehabbing much more slowly than expected.  So I've been doing the work of two for quite a while and will for quite a while more, and was really looking forward to a vacation, even if it was only a week.  However.

We are fortunate that Janet was able to get to the hospital in Pittsfield in good shape as that meant her fracture was not aggravated by movement.  John and Mary were yeoman help, even as they juggled being hosts for their unexpected guests from Peru.  Since Janet's immobilized knee wouldn't fit into our little Fiat (we call her "Bella"), Mary drove Janet back while I followed.  Mary stayed an extra night and helped get things set up.  I had to get back into the office more than I wanted.

The cast is purple, but that's about it.  It holds Janet's leg out straight and she can't put any weight on it.  So she uses a walker and hops around.  We moved her Mom's old recliner into the den, moved some things out, and we both sleep in the guest room.  When we first moved in this house, we knew that none of our parents (all still alive then) would do well with stairs, so we converted the dining room into a guest room.  Little did we know that some day we would be "guests" ourselves, using Janet's mother's recliner, a walker just like the one her father used, and a rolling table that we used when her father came to visit.  Fortunately for Janet, we had just replaced the old big screen TV in the den with a big flat screen, so at least she gets that.  She also has the incredible Bose radio from her father's apartment.  But she can't get around much, can't take baths or showers, can't really cook, or do wash, can't drive or take those nice long power walks, and (these really break her heart) can't rake leaves, take out the garbage or recycling, water the plants, vacuum, clean bathrooms, paint, sweep the walks, trim hedges and bushes, chase deer away, take Dasha out, go to the cleaners or grocery store, or book store, or mall, etc.  You get the picture -- I sure do!  She's already made it clear, though, that she, the Disabilities Coordinator at McCarter Theater, is going to see opening night this fall as a "person with a disability."  And she's getting ready to go back to work.  But we'll miss the Springsteen concert at the Meadowlands.

We see the doctor again tomorrow for a follow-up x-ray to make sure all is healing well.  We'll keep you posted.  Thanks for all your good wishes.

The X Factor

It's quiet here tonight, but our thoughts are with Janet. She and Peter should have left Pittsfield today to start their New England vacation. But instead, they went back to NJ with the plans to see a doctor after Janet broke her leg on Saturday morning, on day one of their vacation here in the sunny Berkshires. It was a fluke break, as she fell during her walking exercise regime. Peter and Janet spent the better part of the morning in the Berkshire Medical Center, and they decided to overnight one more night before they headed back this morning. Janet was in a fair amount of pain, especially when anything caused her to move her leg, but otherwise was in good spirits. They have a long road in front of them.

Sean starts his second year of law school this week, and Johanna is
coming home on Tuesday to help out.

Adding to the complicated weekend was a call from Connie and Allen,
friends from Peru who were stranded in Albany with no place to stay.
They stayed a couple of nights when Peter and Janet were here, and
kind of added to the confusion.

We had arrived home a couple of days earlier from our Canada vacation,
following my own stint in the hospital. Antibiotics are a wondrous
thing, and all is better on my front,. Too bad they don't fix a
broken leg as fast.

We had stopped for three nights with our friend Cliff at his "cabin"
in northern Maine. We did our usual Maine stuff there - put bait out
for bears, drove around looking for moose (tracks but no animals), and
swam at our favorite. cold swimming hole. On the way home we stopped
at a kilt maker in Maine to scout out kilts for Joe.

Two signs from our trip: "There is no I in team, but there is a U in
suck." And when we got in Maine, there was a sign on a garbage
barrel: "For your good health, barrel picking is prohibited." Sad.
And, we stopped at a store that advertised it sold pizza and guns. I
wonder if that's a new topping?

We see updates from Montana on David and Paula's trip out west.
Fishing and visiting haunts where we had gone to as kids. There was
one picture from the road to the sun in Glacier Park that Mary and I
visited two summers agom but was back then completely clouded in. We
didn't know there was a peak/butte right there. Couldn't see it.
David and Paula did and took the photo.

Margaret and Andrew went camping this weekend at Chincoteague Island
and sent pictures of the wild ponies running along the beach, with D
eagerly watching. Looks like they had fun.

John and Marilyn started their month-long vacation this week, with a
week with their daughters and families in South Carolina. Then they
head west for New Orleans, Texas and then Colorado. Johnny had mowed
our lawn when we were gone, and it needed it, since we got some badly
needed rain. Thank you!

Joe has moved in to his new apartment and likes it and his new job.
We got a couple of e-mails from Annie who got a new computer and
helped a client with some media training, poising as a Wall St Journal
pushy reporter.

What else? We went to the Guthrie Cetner to see John Gorka, which
unfortuantely Peter and Janet missed. I've been spending a couple of
days a week at UMass helping students who want foreign scholarships
and I got my first homework assignment since 1984.

Danny and Claire started back at school, with Danny in high school
this year, and Claire preparing for senior year and college! When did
that happen? Maybe Claire can submit "Chirstmas in Connecticut" for
her college essays?

Seeing Janet off today, I said "Courage!" She's going to need it and
our prayers.

Love from up here.

Homeward bound

Mary's writing postcards so that means our trip is almost over.

Carnegie Lake

It was a little lonely at the Nassau Inn this morning.  The first time I had walked through the lobby and didn't see a family member.  I walked down to the lake and saw this glorious setting.

Each of us has many memories from this past weekend, but the one common thought I had heard was how much Grandma would have appreciated this get-together.  She left practically no instructions on what she wanted in the way of a memorial, but I think we all knew her well enough to know that this was pretty much -- even more than -- what she would have wanted and more than she expected.  The biggest reason was that everyone made an effort to be together.  Many thanks are deserved for making this so, especially David.  And thank you all for finding and making the time to come to Princeton.  It ain't easy, especially with everyone's work schedules.

There were a few mistakes.  One, I need to correct here is on the cover of Grandma's oral history.  Her birth year was 1926, not 1923.  That was Pop's birth year.  Oh well.  When you share the book with your own next generation, you'll have to correct that.

There were also many things we do normally when we all get together.  Laugh, tease, exercise, eat, reminisce, chat, argue, laugh, nap, eat, go to movies, shop, laugh, and plan.  Did I mention eat?  or laugh?  We cried a little too, at least I did.

We planned our next get-together, in January for Matthew and Tina's wedding.  Save the date!  

And, we also talked about having an annual get-together on or about July 28 in a different place each year.  We floated the idea of Green Lake Wisconsin next summer.   I'm game; anyone else?

It was special to have extended family with us as well - Mike Kline from Kansas, Debbie and Rod Barnes from Texas, Jane Dean from Connecticut and Georgia, Rell and Hope Dean from Florida and Seattle.  We missed Lur as well, and hope for a speedy recovery.

The Pittsfield Dicksons had a lead-in to the Princeton get-together,celebrating first Annie's 25th birthday and then Mary's 60th birthday.  Annie had flown in on a forgettable flight of 21 hours the week before and then joined us right before Margaret and Andrew arrived by car and Joe by train.  We spent part of Mary's birthday on the lake in a party boat where we were treated to the entertainment of D trying to jump int he water to save us all from drowning.   John and Marilyn joined us s well as Mary's Aunt Mary for a steak dinner!  With homemade ice cream from Margaret and Andrew.

We hope everyone made it back okay.  And, that we all have our own special memories.

Love from back here.  

Views

This week's question.  What's your favorite view?  The one that stops you in your tracks and makes you lose track of time as you just sit and stare.  

Pop used to say it was a fire or the ocean.  He and Grandma probably liked the one out their front window, where they had their reading, sewing, needlepoint chairs.

We found one this week on a drive up to Cummington Mass, at the William Cullen Bryant home.  I remember Peter had gone up there last year.  Saturday was Bryant Day in Cummington, and Mary and I went up to hear an author read from his books about Ireland and Pittsfield.  Funny.  But, in this great home, out in the woods in western Mass, Bryant had a great view on top of a hill, with vistas all the way to Vermont probably.  It was an unexpected adventure.

I think Joe is having an adventure, as he has boarded the train in Chicago to come to Pittsfield for the week of birthdays.  (We're going to have a belated celebration for Annie as well.) 

He had been there over the weekend for a friend's wedding.  He has also moved into a new place, and seems to enjoy his work.

Annie had an adventure as well, with an unexpected delay/layover in Seattle on her direct Beijing to Newark flight.  She missed her connection to Boston, but somehow got on a bus and was able to have the weekend with her friends.  She arrives tomorrow from Boston.

Margaret's on her way as well, coming up from New Jersey where she is with Andrew and celebrating his mother's birthday.  She's bringing D, and we need him here to chase the woodchucks and rabbits and crows and deer.  And squirrels.  And maybe even a bear.  Did I mention we saw a big bear poop?  

Speaking of animals, we saw at a store in Cummington a big piece of paper the owners had put up with wildlife sightings.  Most of them had to do with bear.

Mary has been spending her time working on the landscaping for the house.  She has suggestions from everyone, often in conflict.  We had a bunch of dirt delivered this week, and that means someone is on a wheelbarrow duty.  Guess who?  She's also started a master's swim class at the Y, and tried out a yoga class.  

We've been watching Breaking Bad, Mad Men and Friday Night Lights.  And, we're ready for the Olympics.

Remember when it used to rain?  You know, that water that fell from the sky?  We always complained, BUT NOT NOW!  I understand London is having a record year for rainfall.  Send some our way, please.

Hope you're all well.  See you this week in New Jersey.

Lover from over here.  

 

 

 

Vacation land

Are you ready for a vacation?  Then come on up.  There is vacancy now.

 

We have had our share of visitors, but are always ready for more.  Mary's brother Timmy was here for a few days, having come back east from Mexico's Baja for a little R&R following his operation.  He has a huge scar and lost a lot of weight, although not the kind of diet one would recommend.  He stayed here for a few days, and showed us a couple of sites we had not seen - Bennington Pottery and an apple orchard store.  Easy places to dispense with your cash.  We saw him again, after he moved over to stay with John and Marilyn who were having a birthday party for Colleen.  Fun.

 

We also had a visit from Mary's teaching colleague from Maryland and her husband:  Susie and Dave.  They introduced us to a new concept: FOMO.  Fear of Missing Out.  And, while they were here, it seemed like we didn't miss out on much.  Tanglewood, Mt. Greylock, Clark Museum, Edith Wharton's home and gardens, King Kone (photo of Dave)and Dreamaway Lodge, for dinner and music.  (recommended: Sweetback Sisters)

 

What we haven't had here is rain.  And, our garden and yard shows it.  Right now it is threatening to rain, and we hear thunder, and while the weather map shows rain all around, still nothing but a few drops. 

 

A little while ago, I looked outside and saw squirrels and crows on our blueberry bushes, rabbits and woodchucks in our yard, eating weeds I hope.  We also found this week a monster poop, right by our woodpile and garden, which we fear is bear scat.  As we are closing in on final permit/inspections, the conservation commission guy came out and said he saw a deer trail going right through the yard.  And, when we pulled up the black erosion fence, I saw four snakes.  Time for a cat, maybe a dog.  

 

Other news from around - Joe has found a new apartment which he will be moving into this week.  He's seen Margaret a few times and discussed plans for the weeks ahead.  Annie had a big birthday (25) and will celebrate again when she comes home next week (yeah).  

 

Hey, how's your summer going?  We hear David and Paula are planning a trip out west, and Peter and Janet are doing a swing through New England in August.  Andrew and Lur went to Green Lake, and reported that it was HOT! The John Boyles are planning a family reunion in South Carolina followed by a drive out west as well. 

 

When we were at Tanglewood this week (for the 75th celebration) we brought along a Canada book to plan our August trip to Newfoundland.  Exciting.

 

Any other plans out there?  Yes!  New Jersey in less than two weeks.  Looking forward to seeing everyone.

 

Love from up here.   

Summer is green

Are you enjoying the full range of summer?  Baseball, fishing, mowing the lawn at 8pm, gardening, swimming, boating, fireworks, camping.  So much to enjoy, especially when you have power and air conditioning.

 

We left the Washington area just in time.  And, Joe arrived in his rental truck just hours before a serious storm that knowked out power for so many people.  Our friends who lived just down the road from us were without electricity 3 days later.  Joe had to cope with it the next day as he moved in to his temporary apartment in near-100 heat, without power.  Margaret had gone camping, but saw the aftermath of the storm in the campground with trees down and debris everywhere. 

 

We try not to gloat too much, with our 60 degree evenings.  You can remind us in February next year when those 60 degree evenings are 5 degrees.

 

Anyway, our final move had a little adventure.  I think that's part of the equation.  We had all these elements lined up for our departure, including truck rental, movers, colonoscopy, cleaning apartment, stopping in NJ to talk to the minister for Grandma's service, unloading, more movers etc.  And, when the first domino fails to materialize -- in this case the truck -- it kind of, just a little, seems to throw all the other perfectly timed events off.  Aaarghhxfphspvm!!!

 

With a lot of help from Margaret, who took off from work, we got back on track and hightailed it out of DC just ahead of the storm and the heat.  Thanks!

 

At this writing, the Dundee Dicksons and extended families are enjoying Andrew's birthday and Andrew and Lur's anniversary up in Green Lake.  Hope the weather is holding up for you all!

 

I forgot to mention in the last newsletter Annie's big news!  A HAIRCUT!  A radical one.  We saw her on Skype and it looks nice, cute.  We asked for a picture, but I think we'll be able to wait a couple of weeks.

 

A couple of weeks!  Three to be exact.  David has finalized all the arrangements well ahead of time, so we're looking forward to seeing you all and giving Grandma a collective remembrance.

 

Lots of other news.  Where were you when you heard the news of the Supreme Court decision.  Surprised?  Where were you when the Reds fell out of first place?  Stunned? 

 

Hope you had a great 4th!  We did, starting a day early with Mary's friend Marge Murphy's birthday party at our house.  I tried out our new ice cream maker, and we channeled Andrew by renting a pontoon boat.  Lots of fireworks here.  We saw on Facebook that Melodie and Jeffrey headed to Rhode Island and stopped in Pomfret!  Joe was dog-watching for them while they were gone. 

 

We've seen John and Marilyn since we got up here, and Timmy is here with us right now.  He's back east for the first time in 5-plus years, and looking pretty good.  He's lost a lot of weight, but not the kind of diet he recommends - no eating for two weeks while flat on your back from an operation to unblock intestine.

 

I started at UMass this week, at least my graduate assistant postion working part time in the office of scholarship advising.  It's a big bureaucracy, and a friendly one, though.

 

For nature notes, we saw Peter's Facebook photo of a bird nest in his potted plant of fuchsia.  With eggs.  Another summer adventure.

 

So, hope you all are enjoying the season.  It does last forever, right?

 

Love from down here

 

Heat Wave

It had been such a nice late spring,with no need for air conditioning.  Now, when we need the air conditioning, it is broken!  What did people used to do before air conditioning?   I don't think they lived in places like this.

 

Did someone mention Father's Day?  Hope yours was as momentous as mine, a week long affair, starting with brunch with Margaret and Andrew, and phone calls with Annie and Joe.  In between, we had driven up to Pittsfield for a couple of days, with our first load of stuff.  John and Marilyn came over on the big day, and we did the secret Fathers Day handshake.  And, of course, we remembered and thanked our own fathers.

 

The previous weekend I headed up to New York City for a Fulbright Scholarship Board meeting, my last hurrah as a USG employee.  It was an interesting meeting, where we got to meet the Mayor, the City Council President, tour 9/11 Memorial with Daniel Libeskind and host a reception with Susan Rice at the USUN offices.  On the way home, I stopped and had lunch with Peter and caught up on news there, including Sean's interesting law internship over the summer.

 

Joe was in Minnesota when he called, out to visit his friend Tamara who has her internship with General Mills this summer.  He heads to Texas last this week, for the next leg of his fun-employment until the end of June.

 

Annie is as busy as ever, as most of the other native English speakers seemed to have left the firm.  She had a visit from her roommate from Natick, Mass, and she is beginning to think about grad school in psychology, signing up for a GRE prep class.  Margaret also sounds busy, holding things together at her office with others out.

 

Mary talked with Timmy who has finally gotten out of the hospital.  He's pretty sure he's coming east for a few weeks this summer, for a little r&r.

 

I have almost finished the last of my Christmas books, this one a history of the Comanches and a famous chief named Qanah Parker.  I had such a great group of books, including David McCullough's history of Americans in Paris, the Long March (EL Doctorow on Sherman's March to the sea) and a baseball novel called the Art of Fielding.  And, with Father's Day I have the next few months taken care of as well, with the most recent volume of Robert Caro's biography of Lyndon Johnson.  Lucky.  What's on your bookshelf?  Mary's reading a biography of Lawrence of Arabia.

 

Speaking of books, I went over to UMass last week and checked in, and they want me to start with my program assistant-ship on July 1.  I'll be advising students who are applying for Fulbright scholarships.  I also got the course book and reading list for my program.  Not as interesting as my own reading.

 

Spoke with David who seems to be enjoying retirement,but is still cleaning up his office and loose ends.  Andrew called and talked about summer camps for Claire and Daniel, and Claire teaching oboe!  He also called once to say Lur had left him with Miles, who seemed to be winning.  At everything.  Andrew surrendered.

 

While I was in New York, Mary had her retirement send-offs, including a book of well-wishes from her students.  Very nice, rewarding.  One of the reasons for heading up to Pittsfield was to get in the ground all the flowers and cuttings she had received from her colleagues at school.  She now has a friends' garden.

 

Other than that, we are watching the next season of Breaking Bad, and we went to a Bonnie Raitt concert at Wolf Trap (very, very good).   

 

Hope you all are well, and cool!  Love from down here.  

June 9, Happy Birthday

I have one birthday memory of a Pop-birthday, when he turned 60.  Mary and I drove down from New Hampshre and joined David and Paula and Matthew for a birthday dinner at a Marlborough CT restaurant.  Since we had no money in those days, we mimeographed 60 coupons, with things like 1 free dishwasher emptying, a car wash, a bag of kisses, a gutter cleaning, etc.  His weekly letters to us, in all parts of the world, often included a coupon in it!  There were still a few left when we cleaned out Pomfret.

 

And, today is an open house in Fairport NY, a retirement party of sorts for David.  We learned that Jeffrey and Melodie went north for the weekend.  I spoke with him this week, and he sounded like he likes it! 

 

What a great photo of Peter and Janie at reunions.  Sounded like fun.  Peter said he and Janet enjoyed it so much, he didn't even have time to check Mets baseball for the first no-hitter in Mets history.

 

It has been a fun baseball season for family, except we're still waiting for the Red Sox to catch fire.  It has even been nice to have a home town team here doing so well.  Except when they play the Reds.

 

Joe finished school, and got his diploma almost right away.  He is now on, in his own terms, f-un-employment, reading books he has wanted to for a year, and taking sailing lessons on the Charles River.  Sounds like fun-employment.

 

Mary is winding down her school year and her tenure at her current school.  Normally, this is a hectic time of year, and this time around it is not much different.  When people talked about a going-away present, she came up with a brilliant idea in these hard economic times.  She asked for cuttings from people's gardens so she could start a garden in Pittsfield, named the Highland Garden (after the school!) 

 

We spoke with Andrew as well, and he said they had a great time up at Green Lake over Memorial Day weekend.  Lots of talk about colleges for Claire, so we can all help her when we see them in July, give her advice and actually choose the college for her.  Daniel graduated from his middle school, so the family connection after many years with the church school has come to an end.

 

You should check out Annie's blog to hear of her trip to the ocean at Laolongtou, the end of the Great Wall.  We haven't seen Margaret since Memorial Day when we took D up to Pittsfield while she and Andrew went to her 5-year reunion at Wesleyan.  Sounded like a lot of fun.  She sent us a funny video of D trying to grab a ball out of a swimming pool, before giving up and just jumping in.

 

We saw John and Marilyn while we were up in Pittsfield, but unfortunately I spent too much time on the phone back to work, trying to unravel a couple of what seemed like crises at the moment.  I have forgotten what they were about.

 

Mary also heard from Dan a couple of times, most recently with the news that Timmy is in the hospital with an intestinal ailment.  Sounds a little like the blockage Johanna had a couple of years ago.

 

Next week, Mary retires, and so do I, for a second time.  I love the idea of retiring so much I wanted to do it a second time.  Not so sure that Mary likes it, though.

 

Hope you all are enjoying the start of summer.  Isn't it great and worth the wait?

 

Love from down here. 

Catching up - Aunt Ruth

Friday was a memorial service for Aunt Ruth, Grandma and Pop's sister-in-law, who had passed away in April.  I drove up to Lancaster Pennsylvania, and joined David and Paula and Peter and Janet at the service.  At the gravesite, the minister asked if people wanted to share memories of Ruth, and there was not surprisingly consistency in her love for cards, positive persevering with health issues, and love for the Jersey shore.  Ruth's daugher, our cousin Debbie, her husband Rod and their daughers Sarah and Jennifer and husbands and son Parker all came up from Texas, and in between the services, we all had time to catch up after long periods apart.

 

Among the things we learned:

 

-- Ruth and her family went to the Jersey shore every year for over 35 years, a tradition Debbie hopes to pick up again next year.

-- Ruth loved kite-flying at the shore.  The crew went down to the shore Saturday to fly a kite in her memory.

Matthew and Tina have set a date for January 5 for their wedding in New York.  That will make it easy and a wodnerful excuse to extend Christmas vacation for everyone.

-- Ruth has a brother-in-law Willis who is 96, still drives, still plays tennis and says his secret is a glass of scotch every day.  I suspect there are other secrets to his good health.

-- Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bob lived in their retirement community for over 20 years, longer than any place they ever lived.

-- Sean has finished his year and has a great summer internship with someone who has recently been appointed to the federal courts (awaiting confirmation.)  Amanda will be starting her graduate study at Syracuse in the fall.  Sean was going to have a delayed birthday party on Friday evening, since he couldn't celebrate earlier.  I think Joe was trying to go to the party, since he, too, finished his studies last week..

-- David is in his last days before retirement, and has started a project list.  First on his list was getting a NY state fishing license.  Off to a great start!

-- Peter and David have new cars!  Very different kinds of cars.  Peter thought he could fit his Fiat into the trunk of David's Avalon.

 

So, it was sad, but as the minister says, we tend to see each other as families at weddings and funerals. 

 

Mary was not able to come since she had been out four days the previous week due to her bout with bronchitis.  She feels a lot better now, but is still on heavy medication, for a few more weeks.  

 

Hope all the mothers had a great day.  We had brunch with Magaret and her friend Andrew, at a not-your-typical buffet restaurant.  The food was good, but the entertainment was a group of drag queens dancing around the restaurant.  Lots of laughter and smiles and some curious biological wonderment, as you can imagine.

 

Here's some news from Dundee, from Andrew:

 

"Daniel was confirmed May 6, and held himself up as a true gentleman. He also starred in a basketball tournament which had 9th graders pounding  on 8th graders (Daniel's team), but Daniel, with his size, took matters in his own hands. I told him, they give you five fouls for a reason, use them. And he did. Not many players went inside on him. Claire took the ACT for the first time on a trial run and scored a 29, hopefully giving her dad some money breaks. We'll see. She also was the main catalyst for her club volleyball team to sweep her last tournament. I was not there, but other parents let us know.  We hope you ARE ALL doing wonderfully! We LOVE YOU and miss you! See you soon ! Andrew"

 

I passed the one month-to-go mark for my brief return to work.  I am looking forward to the end and to moving up north this summer.  Mary, on the other hand, may be looking forward to summer vacation, but is sad about leaving her work situation.

 

Mary is taking classes, a computer class to learn all the ins and outs of Apple computers, and yoga and guitar.  I feel like such a slug.

 

We spoke with Annie these past two Sundays; she has bought her ticket home for July.  Yippee!

 

Hope you too have a yippee week.  Love from down here. 

 

 

 

 

May Days

Why does it seem that there is never enough news to report after one week, but too much after two weeks?

We start with a strange coincidence.  David posted on his Facebook page of a meeting with William Zinsser, a writer in New York City who he struck up a correspondence with.  So, in speaking with David, he mentioned that the meeting was Friday morning.  It turned out that I too was in NYC Friday, and then we discovered we were staying in hotels a couple of blocks away from each other.  How's that for communication!  

I had gone up to do some planning for a meeting in June of the Fulbright Scholarship Board, and David was on one of his last trips for business, with Paula joining.  And this may be David's last week at work, although he officially retires at the end of the month.  Congratulations!  I picked up some new vocabulary, as one of meetings was at MTV, where I heard two producers talk about putting together a "sizzle" for a reception we're hosting.  Hmmm.  I think I am ready to go out to pasture.

I had tried to get Mary to join me in NY but she wasn't feeling too well.  Turns out she has bronchitis and missed a couple of days of work.  She got some strong meds, but that didn't prevent her from getting short of breath and a Saturday evening spend in urgent care.  I am afraid I am one week behind Mary in this.  Trying to ward it off.

When we looked up bronchitis we came across a few sites on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, which I wish I had seen last November:  "As COPD gets worse, you may be short of breath even when you do simple things like get dressed or fix a meal. It gets harder to eat or exercise, and breathing takes much more energy. People often lose weight and get weaker."  Back then I just wanted an explanation.  A little late.

Last weekend, we went to the Eastern shore in Maryland, as we are conscious of our limited time left down here.  We stayed in a town called Cambridge Maryland at a B&B, and it turned out the owners were Foreign Service, and he had worked on the Mexico desk when we were in Mexico.  Small world.  We had some nice meals, went to a Maritime museum where we learned about life and work in the Chesapeake region in the past century - racism, slavery, Underground Railroad, oyster dredging, yachting and a lot more.

  We hiked in the Blackwater Reserve and joined friends in Annapolis for a Kathy Mattea concert, all of which I am sure made Mary sicker.

News from Illinois is Claire tearing up the volleyball court, Daniel taller than Andrew now, and Myles almost walking!    Joe is in his final weeks of studying and grading papers.  Crunch time.  Annie did her taxes!  Margaret and I went out to lunch on Take Your Child to Work Day - figured she didn't want to join the ten year olds playing with the sirens of Secretary Clinton's motorcade.  We had a shortened happy hour with her and Andrew, before we headed to Virginia to see a high school girls lacrosse game, in which Mary's friend Gerry's daughter sprained her ankle and is out for the rest of the season.  Bad luck.

Some other big moments:  John Boyle hit a major birthday milestone, Sean's birthday is coming up and then there is Mothers Day!  

Anyone following the campaign?  the NHL playoffs (go Caps)?  Baseball (sorry Mariano, go Nats! and Reds, of course.)    

All is well, but will be better without bronchitis.   Hope you are well.  Love from down here.

Baseball and taxes

Question of the week.

 

How best to pick yourself up after doing taxes all day, and figuring out the gi-normous bill to Uncle Sam?  One would think it would be baseball.  And so, with Margaret and Andrew, Melodie and Jeffrey and Melodie's cousin, we sought our escape.  A good time was had by all, but a better time by those who don't live and die by the Reds.  The Nationals spanked the Reds.  Consolation?  Mary said the game was short.  Nice to see Melodie and Jeffrey who look great.

 

It does serve as a highlight since the last letter.  Still, there were others.

 

Mary headed north during her spring break, first to spend time with Marj and Lew at their new, beautifully renovated home, and then to check in on Dan and Maura, Steve and Elsie.  Despite a flat tire a mere 30 minutes away from her final destination, compounded by the fact that this fancy hybrid has a battery that is so big there's no place for a spare tire, Mary did not let it spoil her time in RI.  I flew up to Boston and we headed for dinner with Joe and Marj and Lew, at a restaurant near Joe's home.

 

We spent the night with Joe, and then had breakfast the next morning with Steve, my college roommate, who told us he had had a heart attack and an operation to put in a stent.  We're that age, and he is probably the most fit person I know.  It is his genes, and he says it would have been a different story had he not exercised his whole life.  We then had lunch with the Lochery's, our British friends from Lagos who have become U.S. citizens (go team!) and whose children have continued to be intertwined with ours.  Joe and their oldest daughter who were together in playgroup in Lagos, ended up being housemates in a group house a couple of years ago.

 

We headed to Pittsfield, and the next day Joe helped me burn the huge pile of brush that had been cleared out over the past year.  Danny came with lobsters for all, and the all included Peace Corps friend Charlie and his family, who were up north looking at colleges for their son.   On Easter we our continuing a tradition of fancy dinner out (remember The Harvest) with a dinner at the Red Lion Inn.  We saw John and Marilyn that night and their granddaughter Natalie put on a cello recital for us.

 

The weekend before Peter had come down to DC for a banjo workshop, that I joined him at.  Fun.  He was driving his nice Red Saturn, which I believe does have a spare tire.

 

Out west, or at least as far west as anyone in this family, we hear news of basketball (Daniel), oboe recitals at Easter (Claire) and college trips for Claire.  Any news on Miles?  Photo?

 

Coming up is Peter's birthday, and Sean's birthday and Mother's Day!

 

One major sad note was the passing of Aunt Ruth, Mom and Pop's sister-in-law, who has been valiantly struggling with cancer and eye problems for years.  She had gone down to Texas to be near her daughter Debbie as her health was failing.  We had seen Aunt Ruth last May, when she, Debbie and Rod had come to Meadow Lakes.  Her memorial service, David and Paula inform us, will be May 18.

 

Love from down here. 

March

went in like a lamb and is going out like a lion.  Everything is not as it seems.

 

Including this letter.  I remember when Pop used to get the Alumni Weekly each week.  Then it went to every other week.  Now it is whenver the heck they feel like it.  So it is with Pop's Weekly Letter.

 

But, not for lack of news!  Most important, baseball season starts next week.  I told Mary it was time to purchase satellite radio.

 

Work is, well work.  I miss retirement.  David is rapidly approaching that wonderful moment.

 

And Joe came down for his spring break, looking for work.  He interviewed with a bunch of federal government agencies, as part of his fellowship program.  He should hear soon, and then begins the securiity process again.  Margaret too is in job market.  Margaret moved into her new apartment and is walking 3 miles a day to work.  She looks great. 

 

We actually held to our Lenten fast of no desserts, and Mary has lost weight, along with her exercise program of 10,000 steps a day.  She is on spring break now, and will drive up north on Monday.  I plan on going to Boston on Wednesday evening and we'll spend the night with Joe before heading to Pittsfield for Easter.

 

It looks as if things are falling into place for July 28, thanks to David and Paula's organization!   Thanks.

 

We spoke with Annie on Saturday and she was getting ready to go to work.  Why?  Curious custom, when they have a holiday during the week, they have to go to work on the weekend.  Anyway, she will be going to western China for a quick visit during their holiday next week.

 

Mary and I have been getting in to live streaming for our infrequent television watching.  We just finished both seasons of Downton Abbey, and we're catching up on a show we watched every now and then called Friday Night Lights, about high school football in Texas.  Both are kind of soap operas.

 

Tonight though, we'll be watching the NCAA basketball games, and Mary is still in the lead in her bracket at school.

 

Speaking of gambling, did anyone buy a MegaBall ticket?  Did anyone win, and decide not to tell the rest of us?

 

We hope to see Peter in a few hours, and hope he's driving their new Saturn.  We spoke with Andrew, and they have been on some college tours with Claire.  We hear she likes Wooster.  Doesn't everyone?

 

Go Buckeyes!  Have a great two weeks!  Love from down here.

   

 

 

St. Patrick's Day

How did you celebrate St. Patrick's Day?  We did more than we usually do, which is wear green and eat Irish soda bread. 

 

We first happened upon a parade last weekend, as we set out to go to a museum.  With traffic blocked, we quickly changed plans and enjoyed the show across the Mall.  And that show included an African-American middle school band, a Bolivian dance troupe, and Falan Gong (Chinese) dance group, and a Central American music group.  Interspersed were the Irish dance schools where young girls outnumbered boys by about 1000 to 1.  Fun.  One marcher, dressed as a Cardinal (but not) came up to Mary and said "You look like a Colleen."  I wonder how many Irish dancers there are in the Cinqo de Mayo parades.

 

Friday night we went out to the Irish pub in Bethesda and listened to a bag-pipe and fiddle rock group from Canada called The Rogues (very good).  And last  night, we wore green and went to Baltimore to eat at Bertha's Mussels, where we got green bumper stickers which said "Eat Bertha's Mussels!"  Lots of revelry in the inner harbor area; more than we expected. 

 

One more St. Patrick's Day comment:  for years I have been calling Mary "Santa Maria of Parking."  Both Friday and Saturday nights in the craziness, we got parking on the (crazy streets,) in front of our destinations.  I hope someone is keeping track of these miracles.  Small ones.

 

Joe is here now, as he arrived last night for his spring break week, to coincide with his job search program.  He spent Friday night with Sean, Amanda and Johanna on their own "night before" celebration in Hoboken.  Sean is also off school for spring break.

 

Other big news is that Margaret moved to a new apartment.  She is living in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Washington, just south of Catholic and Howard universities.  Mary and I went over to check it out; a nice neighborhood and a nice apartment which passed our security inspection.

 

Early in the month I was able to spend a few days up in Pittsfield, checking on the house and meeting with contractors.  I had gone to a conference for work at SUNY Albany, so did my usual driving back and forth.  But the garage is coming along nicely, and even found snow on the ground.  One morning the temperature was 12 degrees, and the workmen still came to do the roof.  I spoke with Johnny who has been commiserating through a long winter without snow.  Marilyn has been volunteered on a woodcarving projects:  horses for a merryground!

 

We've heard from Rochester, Dundee and Pennington, mostly about planning for July 28 weekend.  A couple more days and it's David's birthday!   That gets him closer to retirement.

 

And we also spoke with Dan and Timmy in Mexico.  Dan had traveled to spend a couple of weeks with Tim who is south of Tijuana, but may have contracted pneumonia on the plane.   He had a hospital trip, but is feeling better.

 

Next weekend Peter comes to town for a banjo workshop, and I bought my first baseball ticket of the season.  Reds-Nats in April.

 

Anyone else doing an NCAA bracket?  Mary is and she's doing pretty well so far.

 

That's a wrap.  Love from down here. 

What happened to winter?

The hot question of the year, is what exactly did the groundhog see to cancel out winter altogether.  It's not that I mind the miniscule heating bills, or even the fact that there are daffodils and birds chirping in February, but C'MON MAN!  So watch for a big snowstorm this week as I drive up north for a couple of days - just my luck.

 

The big news of the year was just made official.  David is going to retire!  Congratulations.  We just got off the phone with David and Paula and they sound very excited!  Of course.  Who wouldn't be?  You earned it.

 

Earlier today, Mary and I went to visit Margaret's new apartment, which is very nice, and backs up to a small park, in a neighborhood called Bloomingdale.  Very nice.  We also talked to Annie and Joe today - a hat trick.  Annie has her first customer for her new small business, and she is involved with some exciting work projects.  Joe called to talk about his job hunt, and he's coming down in a few weeks to meet with folks in a couple of different government offices. 

 

We had a real nice trip up to Ottawa, staying in our old house.  We did not do much of the planned winter sports activities, since the canal was closed to skating and our skiing outing was interrupted by our host falling and dislocating his shoulder.  My standard line in starting out these kinds of activities is "My goal is to stay out of the hospital."  And, that;s what I said, but for the first time, we actually ended up going to the hospital.  Not sure I'm going to ever kid around like that again.

 

Still it was nice to see the place, walk around and go to our familiar haunts, like the French cafe and our local pub.  And it was especially nice to hang out with our firends in our old house.  And that Margaret and her friend Andrew were able to be there too!

 

Big news from Dundee area this week as well, with Daniel's birthday.  Way to go!!  Andrew got a nice recognition at work, aand Claire is tearing up the volleyball court.

 

Mary and I spent yesterday helping out a Habitat for Humanity house-building activity, through church.  It was our first time ever doing that (even though our house in Pittsfield was along the same lines.)  We did use a table saw and a power hammer for the first time.  Wish I had done that before we were working on our house.  We met the homeowner who was working as well.  He's an Ethiopian guy.  I tried to imagine him explaining to his family back home that he came to this country with his wifer and two daughters, applied to buy a house and a bunch of Americans spent nine months volunteering and helping him renovate his new house.  I seem to remember Jeffrey doing Habitat projects with his Boy Scout troop.

 

It's been work, work, work pretty much for the last month.  We did watch the Oscars and our favorites didn't win, just like the Super Bowl.

 

But spring training has started.  Hope springs eternal. 

 

Love from down here.