Happiness is a ....

You may wonder - but you probably don't - how the photos are selected for these letters. It's easy.  As many as possible. And this time, there are so many that I'm tempted not to write anything at all. Except, that there's so much to include. And every picture tells a story.

For example, the picture of Simon at school jumps out when you look at his shirt and fill in the blanks of how it got so dirty. Or, the picture of Kiernan and Sean tells the story of a visit to the doctor, but neither of them look sick. Or, how about Joe and Thomas at the baseball game, where Thomas would have outlasted all of us, even though he had had a full day at school. What about Claire with friends (teachers?) soaking in the joy of a convertible. What's that backstory?

But there are others I couldn't squeeze in. Let's start with the birthdays. Happy birthdays to Paula and Tina, and looking ahead to Johanna and Auden. That's a lot of photos of blowing out candles. Or singing, as Donald and Everett show us.

All these pictures remind me of a friend who recently sent me a George Bernard Shaw quote – "A happy family is but an earlier Heaven." Or of a holocaust survivor's quote, "Happiness is a choice."

That last quote came from a play we went to this week called The Happiest Man Alive, which recounts the true and obviously harrowing story of Eddie Jaku, and there's a book and a TED talk to go with it.

The other quote comes from a friend who read through the book Have a Great Week, Love! Pre-publication activities are proceeding, and we are looking at a November date.

Happiness, for us, was a couple of visits to Washington, with a delayed rain date tickets for a baseball game. We wanted to invite Jeff and Melodie but they were getting over illnesses.  We watched Simon one night while his parents went to a wedding, and we had a marathon swimming pool outing.

Hearing Andrew and Lur recount their trip up to Kohler Wisconsin sounds like happiness too. They all went to a concert by a group we should have heard of before, called Guster. They also squeezed in a field hockey game with a Lawrenceville friend.

And happiness in Jersey is Janet back at the theater doing audio description.

Not so happy was our furnace situation. With temps going down into the 40s and 50s, the house was chilly when we got back from DC. What was supposed to be a quick visit by the plumber to turn on the pilot light turned out to be a major fix to the fan, along with a major bill. I have a picture of the broken part, but it's not so happy, except that we now have heat again. And, it gave us an excuse to get a free consult from Johnny, who filled us in on the next steps for his heart valve procedure.

Back in DC, Joe and Leonor have found more permanent quarters which they hope to move into soon. It's not far from where they currently are, and still walkable to school. It's near Sherman Circle which seems to be a busy place for families. We'll head back down there next weekend to see if we can help out with the move or with daycare during the move.  Is there such a thing as move-care??

We also had a consult with Annie about trip plans and what we'll do before and after the ceremonies. She and Sankhar have both been sick, but they still managed to squeeze in outfit preparations – one line from her latest chronicle stuck out for me: "for our wedding, we'll spend 25 times more on the bride outfit compared to the groom (and this does not include makeup, etc.). I'm starting to understand why the wedding industry is the fourth largest industry in India."

And with that thought hanging, we'll close this letter out with a final happiness wish for you.

Love from up here.   

Too dark to see

It's dark this morning when I woke up. And this week is the official end of summer. And don't even talk about the garden. What a weed fest. We do have pumpkins, small ones, one for each of the grandchildren. Why did I plant pumpkins?  They have drowned out the cucumbers, which I actually like. Oh well. As Mary says, live and learn. Next year.

We headed back to DC this week to help out the only residents in that city who are recently arrived from Brazil by way of Portugal. Joe was off for a week of travel to Taiwan and Korea. Everyone is settling in nicely, and it is a big adjustment. We went to grandparents' day at Joao's pre-school, and it was nice, even if he didn't know the word for "grandparent." He is rapidly picking up English, and speaking it so proudly. We walked to their school a few times, led by Thomas who knows his way around the neighborhood. Luisa mostly watches her brothers, but as soon as they're gone, she lets fly with jibberish that must mean something to her. Fun.

One day after school we took the two boys over to Simon's school and playground and then surprised Andrew for dinner. And we had all gone to an indoor playground on the rainy Sunday, followed by lunch at my favorite restaurant. Micky Dee's. Nice to be so close to cousins. Remember that?

Another day, while everyone was at school, we took the bus down to the mall and walked over to the Library of Congress. I had an appointment in the Manuscript Reading Room, trying to track down anything I could find on John Shields and the Dalton Gang. I struck out, looking through a box of Pinkerton Detective Agency records, because Jay Dean had told me that John Shields was employed there. Well, all the records I could find had the names of the outlaws but only a few of the actual lawmen. Hmm.  Where to next? Do I give up? No way.

Speaking of John Shields, it was sad to hear that Mike Kline, our cousin from Kansas passed away. His mother was Dorothy Shields Kline, technically Grandma's aunt, but not that much older, so more like a cousin. Mike had a difficult struggle with cancer, and when we saw his daughter Alden in Hawaii in March, she told us the cancer had returned and spread.

Also, sad to read about Tina's grandmother. I remember her at the wedding and reception. And, in many of Tina's posts.

One more item from DC - look out Coco and Serena because Margaret is taking tennis lessons.

On the way down to DC, we checked in with David and Paula, who continues to make good progress on her recovery. She's been out a few times, and working hard at PT. A long road.

Also on the medical front, John Boyle went into the hospital for a procedure to check out heart blockages, before he has to return to get his heart valve repaired. Fortunately, they didn't find major problems which means he doesn't have to have open heart surgery, but a less invasive procedure, similar to the one Mary had a few years ago.

One of the photos here must be the luckiest coincidence in the history of humanity. Look at the hat Andrew found at a thrift shop in Illinois. Now there's a story I'd like to read, how that hat made its way out there. Or maybe we should just make one up. Perhaps with the help of artificial intelligence. Claire is back at school, and coaching volleyball this year. And here's a photo of four visitors to their grandparents.  

And now for the latest from Annie, who unfortunately is also suffering from a prickly heat rash on her back: "In today's Tamil class we learned probably the most important question: "Sappiteengalaa?" - "Have you eaten?" Over the past six weeks, I've learned that the best form of small talk is anything revolving around food. "Have you eaten?" is usually asked after "How are you?" Followed by, "What did you eat? Where? Was it good? Are you hungry?" or "What? Why haven't you eaten!? Are you hungry?" Even while eating, you can spent half the conversation talking about food - what else you ate that day, if you like the food you're eating, what we should eat next. And I'm slowly learned to be prepared to share whatever I'm eating."  I'm already hungry.

As I head to the kitchen, sending you our love from up here. Look out for hurricanes this weekend!

Vacations and Stay-cations

Say goodbye to August. Not Pat and Jen's 4-month-old, but the month. We actually saw them yesterday, down in Westerly RI, which is one reason why the letter is late. 

No, say goodbye to the summer. How did that happen?  It went by in a whirl. I wonder if we didn't pack it in, then it would go by slower. Hard to even remember that Annie and Sankar were here with us for a couple of those months. Seems like ancient history. But fun ancient history.

Speaking of Annie and Sankar, here's a little snippet from her latest missive: "Big news is last weekend we went wedding saree shopping. Sankar's Mom and aunt met us in the South Indian capital of silk, and especially silk sarees: Kanchipuram. Apparently, it was an auspicious day, at the start of wedding season, so there were about 1000 people in the shop. Everyone was seated on the floor in groups of 5-12, with an assigned shop attendant who unfolded and refolded what seemed like hundreds of sarees. Yes, I got mine for the reception and wedding - exciting. But we also got 20+ more. We spent four hours there (not to mention Sankar's mom who arrived two hours before us), and most of the time was spent picking out sarees for specific family members to wear to the wedding. The best part - there was a tea and samosa shop on the second floor."  A photo is below.

The other big news is school started. We had almost hourly updates as Thomas started kindergarten, and John and Simon went to pre-school. There were some tears at the start of the day, and fatigue at the end of the day. I'm not sure if John was crying because he didn't have the language, or he missed his mother, or his backpack was almost as big as he was. His brother, though, even wanted to stay for after-school day care. Did he want to sleep there too? 

One Dickson family opted to go south before their sons went back to school. Matthew and Tina headed to Orlando, which fortunately wasn't in the direct hurricane path, at least not Idalia. Maybe Hurricanes Donald and Everett. I can't help but ask, in relation to the photo here who was the goofiest. Looked like a lot of fun.

Margaret also had a vacation, but didn't go anywhere, so I guess it qualifies as a stay-cation. Sounds heavenly. Joe and Leonor continue their house-hunting, trying to squeeze in visits in between school drop-offs.

After not going to Tanglewood almost all summer, we crowded three visits in a week. To John Williams film night, Star Wars, and Jackson Browne. All three were terrific, the last one with the Super Blue Moon rising next to the big screens.

We too had kind of a stay-cation, but not planned. We were supposed to go up to Vermont for our by now annual visit to the "northeast kingdom," but a few days before Charlie (where we stay) wrote us with pictures of his home in North Carolina that had been demolished by a tree falling during a micro-burst. They had better things to do than go bike riding and maple ice cream eating.

Instead, we stayed home and played host to other Peace Corps friends who have a home in Michigan, on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, and on the western shore of Ireland. It was fun reconnecting, but we had nothing to do with the coup the day after our friends left here.

It was interesting that Gabon had so much news attention, likely due to the other coups in Niger and elsewhere in Africa. The electronic talking drum was busy that day with friends all exchanging news about the fraudulent election and military takeover hours after the winner was announced. One friend had presciently written the day before the election and said, "Wonder who's going to win?" I guess it was one election "victory" too many for the Bongo family. Except that it was a cousin of Bongo who is the general in charge now.

On our last trip to Washington, we went to the Independence Day reception hosted by the Gabonese Ambassador. He used to work at the Peace Corps office in Libreville, and he used his remarks to gush about Peace Corps and to say he was hopeful that Peace Corps would return there. Pretty sure that prospect is on hold.

Anyway, happy Labor Day to everyone, happy start of school and fall and football.

Love from up here.