catching up

Well, a long time has passed between blogs. How interesting to look at where I was in August and what has come of it all.

First, Urban Village has lived up to its first impression. I made the decision to switch from Berry to Urban Village, and from the first service that I mentioned in the August blog until now have rarely missed a service. I have found myself spiritually reinvigorated, excited about going to church again. And more than that, I have become compelled to keep live out my faith throughout the week. I am much more aware of mission opportunities, helping with the Market Pantry each month, giving to UMCOR to help with the victims of hurricanes etc. And I agreed to lead a small group for Urban Village - which is a great experience. And I am doing Disciple 3 with a small group. And perhaps the biggest thing is that I agreed to take on the role of Director of the Lay Academy, which is a big job. My spiritual life is fuller and richer than it has been in a number of years and I am grateful for that every day. Urban Village has helped me to reconnect in an amazing way.

I finished the tax training and got hired by H&R Block; I worked there nearly every night from January 1 through April 18. I absolutely loved it, I really loved working with clients one on one. I felt like I was helping people, it was overall a great experience and I can't wait to do it again next year.

There is a lot more to catch up on, but over time.

A very different kind of summer. For the first time in 16 years it is not time to start preparing for Gloria to go back to school. I know it is a really different summer for her, looking for a job and just beginning to realize that for the first time in her memory September does not mean school. But for us too, it is a big change. This time it is me starting school. I am taking a tax class at H & R Block. It may not sound that exciting, but I have high hopes for it. The class is fairly intensive, it is 84 hours of class instruction in under 3 months, and University of Phoenix (I know!) allows 4 credit hours if you choose to go down that path. But the goal is to learn to do taxes and hopefully get a part time job at Block during tax season. All presuming that I like doing this -- I expect to, but one never knows.

Work is in transition too with the two projects I have been working on finishing. One is nearly there, just in the last phase of close down. The other will be finished in October or November, depending on how much post-deployment activity there is. I will be moving to a different role, and I look forward to new and very different challenges there. So for me, Fall is a time of starting up, of transitioning.

But there are some other large goals in front of me too. The first is all around health. I have started a yoga class - very light duty for a yoga enthusiast, but for me it is a pretty big deal. And focussing on exercise most days of the week, eating healthier and trying to get control. I am doing a combination of walking on a treadmill, preparing for a walk for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention at the end of September, and yoga and aerobics. This will require me to exercise self discipine more than exercising my body! I don't mind grey hair and wrinkles, but creaking joints and lack of energy can be combatted.

The final front is a spiritual dimension. For too long I have been allowing myself to drift, dissatisfied with my church, letting my spiritual practices lag, feeling the tug of inertia. It is time to take my faith journey back into my own hands and find a source of energy. After talking about it for quite a while, last week Joy, Gloria, Sonja and I visited Urban Village, a new church started in the spring downtown. We all came away eager to go back, excited about a sermon series on the book of Genesis. I have been feeling that my church demands little spiritually, it has not provided me with the structure and accountability I long for. I am in a covenant group that supplies some of that, but we only meet monthly and it is possible to slip a long way in a month. I found that I came away from Sunday's service at Urban Village feeling energized and clear that the responsibility for my journey is in my hands. I was challenged and excited. This Sunday we are going back, and are interested to hear what the sermon on sin brings. Sin is rarely discussed in the contemporary church, it might demand us to change in some way. Feelgood church is not about change, it is about 'do your own thing and that's ok'. Perhaps we could also put some flowers in our hair and head for San Francisco......... the 70's live!

At any rate, all around me, everywhere I look there is a goal, a challenge, a chance to change and grow, to improve. I look forward to this time and am committed to sticking with it and taking charge of my life.

Real life is not as much fun as vacation - well there is a surprising insight, right?

Real life is filled with work and party plans and quilting. And newly introduced to the mix, yoga. Gloria and I started a yoga class that is intended for people who have no prior yoga experience and who need modifications to do the poses. I have learned a few things in the first month of the class. One is that yoga is real exercise. I always was sort of interested, but had the idea that it was gentle and meditative. I am finding that on different days it varies, but it is absolutely exercise, sometimes it really pushes me to the limit. I considered last week some kind of success because the sore muscles were easing up by Sunday, unlike the weeks before when they lasted into the week. And I only had to take Advil twice in one night the first night after class instead of for a few days. I find that it motivates me to want to do more. So I ordered two DVD's, one is a yoga class for 'fuller figures' and the other is low impact aerobics. Now the hurdle is to get time in the living room so that I can give them a try. I am actually excited about exercise, which is NOT a common condition for me.

On the quilting front, I have been able to do one to two hours of hand quilting each night since Sunday, it is actually starting to show. I don't have a square yard quilted yet, but getting there. I do like this part of the process. I enjoy the handwork, I enjoy the feel of the quilt as parts are quilted. It begins to change, to become softer, to drape more. And I enjoy getting to have one last close look at the individual fabrics as I work my way along.

Other than that, we are in the throes of party planning, Gloria's graduation party is Saturday. We have done quite a bit of the shopping, ordered the cake and started the cleaning process. Jovito has been a dynamo this week, he fixed the bench, vacuumed, mowed the grass and edged, waxed the kitchen floor ..... and the list goes on. We have enough beer and wine to make people forget anything we miss. (Just kidding - we really do have beer and wine but we are really not very big drinkers.).

I have tomorrow off work, a three day weekend is kind of like a vacation. Even if I am shopping and cleaning it is fun and different from my daily life. And most important, I am not spending 3 hours in the car just to commute back and forth. The Chicago commute is worse this year than it has ever been, and I have been commuting to Schaumburg for 25 years. If it had been like this in year 1 or year 5 I would never have celebrated a 10th anniversary. Now I have been there too long to want to leave. Fortunately I am working one day a week at home, and for a few months in the fall I will be working two days a week at home. That helps a lot.

I got the rainbow quilt sandwiched and basted and started marking it. It is now decorating our dining room table, until the marking process is finished. I am hoping that will be the next couple of days. I am really looking forward to sitting with the quilt and quilting it, that is a time that I find peaceful. I like the process of spending quality time with each hoop sized section of the quilt. By the time I have completed it, I feel that I know each square personally, and there is a lot of 'me' in the quilt. There is also a lot of my thoughts, prayers, meditations, hopes for the person for whom I am making the quilt. In this case, it is for my daughter who has recently graduated from college. I feel that the quilt is so appropriate to this time in her life, a rainbow for me is a sign of hope; at this time when she is embarking on the next phase of her life after 16 years of being in school (since Pre-K) it seems to be such an appropriate metaphor.

The rest of the week was spent in a much more mundane way, a Kaizen session to improve the forecasting process used to manage the budget my company's portfolio of IT projects. For those not familiar with the process (as I was not) here is a description of Kaizen:

Kaizen (Japanese for "improvement" or "change for the better") refers to philosophy or practices that focus upon continuous improvement of processes in manufacturing, engineering, supporting business processes, and management. It has been applied in healthcare, government, banking, and many other industries. When used in the business sense and applied to the workplace, kaizen refers to activities that continually improve all functions, and involves all employees from the CEO to the assembly line workers. It also applies to processes, such as purchasing and logistics, that cross organizational boundaries into the supply chain. By improving standardized activities and processes, kaizen aims to eliminate waste. Kaizen was first implemented in several Japanese businesses after the Second World War, influenced in part by American business and quality management teachers who visited the country. It has since spread throughout the world.

It was a structured, facilitated process that used several interesting tools to assist the group in identifying the current process then identify issues, rank them, identify root causes then develop short, medium and longer term resolutions. It was intense and required a lot of concentration. It was a cross functional group so many perspectives were represented. It was a great learning experience. The plans that we identified for resolutions are exciting.

The process that we worked on is one of the more difficult parts of my job, and most months I spend about 4 days on it, so I am personally very invested in improvements that will help to ensure that the results we get are accurate and meaningful. There are many of us who do this work, probably at least 50, so it is a costly process that today does not produce reliable results.

Of course there is now a task force to carry out the actions, and yes, of course I will be a part of that. This afternoon I came back to a rush of questions about the project we are rolling out over the next week, so this week has really flown by. I look forward to working at home tomorrow and catching up as best I can.

Life in Chicago

The vacation trip was great, and I will probably come back and write some more about it. But now for some thoughts on everyday life.

I have been working on a quilt for Gloria for a long time now. She asked for a log cabin quilt in rainbow colors. First stumbling block for me was to figure out the order of the colors in a rainbow. Gloria set me straight on that, she learned it in grade school: ROY G BIV (red-orange-yellow-green-blue-indigo-violet.) My interpretation of that has green/blue in between green and blue. Then I drafted my particular pattern, figured out exactly what colors should be in what squares and how large it would be. The next part was to gather the many, many colors I needed to make 30 blocks in these colors. I used approximately 20 colors per block, and used scrappy fabric. I bought fabric everywhere I went, asked friends for scraps and collected colors over several years. In particular, I was light on yellow, red and orange. I realized as I gathered fabrics that those are colors I use rarely, so I did not have a stash on hand.

After doing all of that, I began to assemble the squares. Over about a year, I made 10 while continuing to gather fabrics in the 'missing' colors. Realizing that at that pace it would take really long, this spring I stepped up the pace and completed the remaining 20 in a couple of months. I have now added the borders and prepared the backing. I have obtained the template I wanted for the hand quilting pattern (Baptist Fan) and marking pens. This weekend I hope to 'sandwich' and baste the quilt, then begin marking the pattern. I am really looking forward to starting the hand quilting process. I especially enjoy hand quilting when it is a gift. It allows me to think about the person who will receive the quilt. It may sound like a cliche, but a lot of love goes into the quilting process.

This quilt has turned out very well so far and I really look forward to seeing it take shape as I quilt it. The rainbow pattern has a lot of significance, since it is the sign of God's covenant with humans. I have always found a rainbow to be filled with hope and peace. I hope that Gloria finds those qualities in this quilt that is being made with so much love and that it is comforting and sustaining in bad times, a pleasure to use in good times.

The other thing I think is of interest is that I have started a yoga class. I have attended two classes, the most recent just a couple of hours ago. The first week was pretty gentle; I was a little sore afterwards. But tonight's class was much more intense, and I am already feeling it. It worked the various leg and buttock muscles a lot, also some upper body. I am pretty sure that tomorrow I will be feeling it a lot. I like the whole concept of yoga a lot. It is very relaxing, even now when it is new and hard. And the stretching feels really good, and so needed. After tonight's class I feel more that this may help to combat the loss of flexibility that I have experienced over the last few years due to arthritis and the lack of stretching exercises. I am determined this week to do some exercise so that I keep gaining that flexibility.

And last night, Gloria and I went to a natural perfume workshop with Joy and Marlene, good friends of ours at another friend's home. We worked with a group of 14 natural oils to develop our own scent. The oils were divided into base, middle and top notes. The first part of the workshop was spent familiarizing us with the oils, then we began to experiment with different combinations. The end result was a 'signature scent' for each person based on our own preferences. Jess, who led the workshop, told us that the perfumes will develop over the next couple of weeks, and that they will change as they age. In addition, they change as they are applied to our bodies. It was a lovely relaxing enjoyable evening. All in all, this has been a good week, and I am really looking forward to the weekend.

We have been home for a week now; I have some additional thoughts on the trip. The last day in Savannah was incredibly hot. It was normal weather for the season but our Yankee blood was not ready for it. The temperature was 100+ and the humidity was very high.

I got up and walked to The Lady and Son (Paula Deen's restaurant) to make a reservation for dinner. It was early enough that the temp was probably only in the low 80's and I did my best to walk in the shade where possible. The line stretched 2 1/2 blocks at 9:10 in the morning. Although we had to stand in the sun part of the time, it turned out to be fun getting to know the other people around me. After about a half hour in line, I walked away with the reservation.

We had decided that we would see the Mercer-Williams house, where Jim Williams of 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil' fame lived, and where the movie was shot. We walked around the historic district for several hours, toured the house and took a number of pictures. I would have liked to see a few other things up close, but the heat was just oppressive. So we walked back and spent a little time in the hotel cooling down.

Dinner at The Lady and Sons was good, it is a fairly informal place with a really friendly staff. We all chose the buffet so that we could get a good sampling of her good old-fashioned Southern cooking - fried chicken, ribs, green beans, mashed potatoes, biscuits, grits, corn cakes and more. Definitely Southern!

The most fun part of the day was the 'Ghosts and Gravestones' tour in the evening. It was on a black trolley, suitably decorated with draped cloth, flowers, a skull etc. And Miss Violet, the tour guide was a delight. She was dressed in a black lace dress with hoop skirt (remember the temperature), hat with feathers tickling her forehead and a fan which she used in true Southern Belle fashion. She was in love with her stories and made the tour a lot of fun. Savannah is considered to be one of the most haunted cities in the United States, so she had plenty of stories to share. Perhaps it is the heat, perhaps it is the Low Country landscape - but Savannah has a dense, brooding Southern Gothic feeling that makes it one of the most interesting places I have visited. The tour ended inside a chandlery on River Street, blessedly air conditioned. It was truly a nice way to end the visit.

The absolute highlight of the trip for me was seeing several container ships on the Savannah River. They were heading from the Port of Savannah out to sea, and were loaded about 10 stories high with shipping containers. It was an awesome sight to stand by the riverfront and watch this behemoth pass by. I do have some pictures that I will post.

Gloria and I capped off the hot day in Savannah with a 10PM swim in the hotel pool, cool water has rarely felt better than it did that night. We had the pool to ourselves for a while, which made it delightfully relaxing.

The next night on the way home, we

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

Savannah is the kind of town that spawns a story like Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. It is an old, old town, incredibly beautiful. The trees draped with Spanish moss contribute to the sense of mystery, as do the old buildings and old stories.

We took a trolley tour of the mile-square historic district. It is filled with small, lovely squares surrounded by interesting old buildings. We saw the house that was the home of antique dealer Jim Williams, accused of killing Danny Hansford, a local male prostitute. There is a bookstore dedicated entirely to 'the book', we plan to visit it tomorrow. We passed a synagogue that is the third oldest in the United States and which houses a Torah from the 1400's. We passed the church where John and Charles Wesley served during their time in Savannah. We passed the church where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. preached his first sermon.

We walked by the river and saw the port area with giant ships, we saw two tugboats and the statue of the 'waving girl' which is a famous Savannah landmark. We stood on the 'echo spot' by the river and tested it out.

We also saw Paula Deen's restaurant, we were too late to get a table for tonight, maybe tomorrow. We walked a bit in the City Market, but it was just too hot to walk there a lot. We used the trolley tour as transportation today, using the on/off feature. So after stopping for lunch in the City Market, we got back on and rode a few stops to River Street. Our first stop there was the Savannah Candy company, where you can get a free taste of praline pecan candy - really good. So of course we got a pound of that, and a big caramel apple because their caramel looked great.

We walked around some of the smaller shops and looked at all the souvenirs. Del Sol has t-shirts, bags, jackets and some jewelry, all of which changes color in the sunlight - very cool. But we went there because we had certificates for a free bottle of water. That was really appealing in today's (seasonable) heat.

Tonight we walked a few blocks and had dinner at a British pub in the heart of the Historic District, called the Six Pence Pub. It was fun to eat in the window and see the horses and carriages go by, along with tour trolleys and rickshaw tours. It is a great place to visit, but most likely winter would be an even better time to visit.

Plan for tomorrow is to get up early and walk to the City Market to try to get a reservation for Paula Deen's, visit a few of the spots we saw today and get an up close look, then in the evening we are taking a ghost tour. Lots to see, a couple of days really just touches the surface.

Sunrise on the beach

I got up in time to watch the sun rise over the Atlantic. The tide was going out, so the beach seemed a mile wide. I walked along the beach while the sky lightened. Suddenly there was a pinpoint of brilliant orange/gold light. Then within 10 minutes the full sun had risen to well above the horizon. It just seemed to explode up. I spent about an hour on the beach, walking on the hard sand, watching the gulls skim the surf looking for food.

Jekyll Island 4th of July

Best 4th of July ever - we are on Jekyll Island GA. Our hotel is right by the beach; we took our beach towels and walked over the dunes on the boardwalk which has footlights to the beach. The tide was low so the beach was broad and the sky filled with stars. The official Jekyll Island fireworks display was less than a mile up the beach and we had a great view sitting on towels by the beach. It wasn't really crowded, the temperature is about 75 degrees and there is a strong sea breeze. There were some people wearing glow in the dark red, white and blue necklaces and bracelets or carrying glow wands. I can't ever remember a better 4th of July.

We ate dinner at a restaurant on the Intercoastal Waterway, sitting on a broad porch surrounded by trees draped in Spanish moss. There was a light breeze and the porch had overhead fans, so it was very comfortable. Ok, I admit the flies detracted a bit from the experience, but what is life without a few flies!

On the way back, we drove around the south end of the island and got stopped in a roadblock. The entire island police force seemed to be there. I had to show my drivers license, and the policeman started to let us go politely then noticed that my license seemed to have expired. I told him to turn it over and explained that is how Illinois does it, with a sticker on the back of the license. He laughed and said 'That can get you arrested down here, we aren't that smart. Have a nice evening.' then handed me my license and let me go. Of course, I really thought that we got stopped because I had a margarita on the porch!

I am loving every minute of being back in the South. Good night y'all.

Thoughts from tropical Florida

We spent the last 6 days in Central Florida, in Lake Wales for 5 days and now in Apopka/Orlando. Lake Wales is 'famous' as the place where, in 2004, the eyes of hurricanes Charley, Frances and Jeanne all passed over Lake Wales, causing residents to evacuate and leaving massive damage in their wake. But the area residents rebuilt quickly and today there are no obvious signs of the destruction.

Perhaps the best known attraction in Lake Wales is Bok Tower Gardens, a botanic garden and sanctuary designed by Frederick Law Olmstead. It is designated a national historic landmark. It is a beautiful peaceful place with miles of paths. (Gloria would tell you that it also, unfortunately, has thousands of mosquitoes.) The singing tower which houses a carillon, sits on what is billed as the highest point in peninsular Florida, with a view for miles. We did visit the garden, but only spent a short time as the temperature was in the mid-nineties, the humidity was high and the sun was shining. It would be a great place to visit in January......

We also visited Spook Hill where cars roll uphill. Here is the legend:

"Many years ago an Indian village on Lake Wales was plagued by raids of a huge gator. The Chief, a great warrior, killed the gator in a battle that created a small lake. The chief was buried on the north side. Pioneer mail riders first discovered their horses laboring down hill, thus naming it "Spook Hill." When the road was paved, cars coasted up hill. Is this the gator seeking revenge, or the chief still trying to protect his land?"

I don't know the real story, but our car rolled uphill backwards, not once but twice. The second time we were picking up speed, but I am not a great backwards driver and we hit the curb.

Mostly our stay in Central Florida was about visiting family. We spent several days with my father, who is 91. While he is doing pretty well, he isn't interested in much activity, so we spent the time at his house, which backs up to a swamp. We found it endlessly fascinating to sit on the screen porch and look over the swamp. It is filled with birds and frogs, which make for lots of interesting sounds. The smallest of frogs makes the biggest of sounds. There are some heron or egret like birds that are brown with red heads, the adults are at least 3 feet tall.

This is the rainy season in this tropical place, so most days between 3 and 10PM there is rain, much of it really heavy. The storms bring out the frogs in full force. And all the wildlife attract predatory birds. We weren't sure if they were eagles or hawks, but there are many, many of them circling above.

Today we visited with my husband's family, there were 5 generations in the house. We had a good time, the house was full of visitors, roughly 20 people. It gave me a good chance to practice Spanish (more listening than speaking skills). Now we are in Altamonte Springs, it is still raining lightly and we elected to not try to attend Red, White and Boom, the fireworks display in Altamonte Springs.

Marching Through Georgia

After two really long travel days (about 12 hours each) we have arrived in Lake Wales, FL. We navigated the last few hours of the trip mostly in a downpour of varying strength. At a couple of points I would have pulled off the road if I could have seen well enough to find a spot to pull off. But we arrived safely. There are very few people staying at the resort where we are, not everyone chooses to travel during the monsoons. Other than the last few hours, the trip was pleasant and uneventful.

By far the most interesting thing that we saw was a giant windmill farm in Indiana. We believe that it is the Fowler Ridge Wind Farm, a joint venture between Dominion Oil and BP Alternative Energy. My research indicates that the first phase deployed 222 wind turbines, a second phase this year added 133 more and a third phase is planned (or underway) to add and additional 150, which will make it one of the largest wind farms in the world. It was an impressive sight, it went on for miles on both sides of the road, as far as we could see. A few years ago, we saw wind farms in southern Minnesota and South Dakota, but this dwarfed anything that we saw then.



After leaving the wind farm and continuing through the very long state of Indiana, we crossed over the Ohio River from Indiana to Kentucky as we entered Louisville. The river is incredibly wide at that point, and is also very beautiful. Jovito found it interesting that the state line is in the middle of the river. We saw Churchill Downs which is an institution. On to Nashville, where we did not see any traces of the major flooding that occurred not too long ago. We got a good look at the Tennessee Titans Stadium. Fortunately we were too early in the year for there to be a game, so traffic was not an issue.

We stayed in Chattanooga last night. We had dinner at Cracker Barrel, which had a 15 minute wait at 9PM, then had a true Southern breakfast at a Waffle House. I enjoyed the Tennessee accents and the Tennessee scenery. Although Chattanooga is far from Johnson City, there are enough similarities to make it feel like home. After breakfast, we drove through the last 10 mines of Tennessee, following a lovely river then climbing the mountains out of town.

We then crossed into Georgia and traveled the rest of the way today. Georgia is a very large state it seems, and encompasses multiple types of geography. The northern part is mountainous and filled with forests; the foothills are rolling with pine forests. Atlanta is truly a big city; since it was Sunday, we drove straight through the middle of town, and it took nearly 30 minutes to get all the way through. It is really a lovely town, quite modern. We saw Turner Field, the home of the Atlanta Braves, which is clearly visible from the highway.

After leaving Atlanta, the scenery begins to change. Southern Georgia has few trees, just small stands, is much flatter than the northern part. It has broad fields where red clay is prevalent. There are many billboards, advertising hotels, restaurants, boiled peanuts, Georgia pecans and Georgia peaches (which happen to be in season). Ok, I have to ask, who has eaten boiled peanuts? I went in a gas station in Gainesville, FL (home to the University of Florida) and they had two crock pots of boiled peanuts, one plain and one Cajun. They had ladles in them and you could scoop out a cup for yourself - I did not indulge, but I was curious.

We passed by the Chickamauga Civil War Battlefield, the Andersonville National Historic Site (the home of the infamous Confederate Civil War prison camp), and Jimmy Carter's home town. I would someday like to visit Andersonville. Years ago I read the novel "Andersonville", written by MacKinley Kantor and I have never been able to forget it.

We had intended to stop and travel the last few hours tomorrow, but once we were four hours away, everyone was eager to push through and finish up the trip. The rain has stopped and we are enjoying the steamy summer Florida evening. We are all pretty tired at this point, more later.

Ready to Head South

I seem to be most interested in blogging when I travel, I think that for me traveling evokes memories and emotions. Surprisingly that is true of the most mundane of travel, it does not have to be exotic or exciting. In my view, every trip seems to have its own special merit.

Our upcoming trip starts with visits to family, first Dad and Ann then Jovito's sister and mother along with assorted family in that area. Fortunately for us, the two families live only about 100 miles apart, making it easy to do a combined visit. Since Dad is 91 and Josefina (Jovito's mother) is 89, we decided not to let any more time pass before visiting.

I am hoping to visit Bok Tower and Gardens while we are in Lake Wales, but it is in the 90's and humid with rain most days so when we get there we may decide that a visit to a botanic garden is not that appealing.

After a week of family visits, to break up the trip home, we will drive up the east coast and visit Jekyll Island, GA for a couple of days and Savannah, GA for a few days. Both of these places take me back to my Southern upbringing. Jekyll Island was a popular vacation spot for Tennesseans, but we never made it quite that far, so this will be the first time for me. And we haven't been to the beach in years, I think the last time was 2001, so that will be fun.

Savannah is billed as one of the 10 prettiest towns in the USA, lots of history, site of 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil', home to Paula Deen's 'Lady and Sons' restaurant, place where the Wesleys spent most of their short time in America, filled with Civil War history.

Then the route home takes us through both Carolina's, Tennessee and Kentucky, which all feels kind of like home to me. Then we hit the flat, far less scenic mid-West that also feels like home.

So stay tuned, more to come.

I have read through some of the posts I did while I was traveling, and it brought back memories of the trip that was, for me, the trip of a lifetime. I am so glad that I took advantage of the opportunity. And although it would have been a lot easier to just stay in London, it was great that it was Gloria's BritRail week. The experience was far richer because we got the opportunity to see many places. I came away with some sense of the island of Britain and the variety that exists within the boundaries of what is really not geographically that large.

I am not able to chose one experience or place as a 'favorite', there were so many that compete for that honor. London was exhilarating, filled with history, diverse and lovely. But Bath houses the site where King Edgar was crowned the first king of all England, the Roman Baths from 420 AD and the Jane Austen center; oh, and Johnny Depp has a house there. Bath was an amazing mix of past and present. The small villages that we visited were pristine and unspoiled despite being the site of numerous movie filmings. Swansea had one of the best museums I have visited, with fresh, interactive exhibits. But it also had a lovely beach, the Dylan Thomas Center, the ruins of a lovely castle, the largest market in Wales and much to recommend it. Edinburgh was looming, dark and gothic and was worthy of a far longer visit than what we made.

My head is filled with images of places that we visited, much like a slide show, except that they come unbidden into my mind at random times and places. I only hope that with the blog, my journal and the approximately 500 pictures, I will be able to hold onto these images and spend the winter polishing them.

I have really enjoyed sorting through my pictures and writing captions, more for me than for anybody else. It is amazing how quickly it is possible to forget why I took a picture of that particular door, or tree or even a church. After all, we did see more than a few interesting churches along the way. I have written captions for most of my pictures, and couldn't resist gathering more information by using Google to find good sources, then cutting and pasting information into the captions. I am sure it is way more information than most casual viewers would want to be bothered with. But I will be able to go back and use the captions to trigger my memory.

It took me about a week to get over the combination of jet lag and just plain being tired from the busy pace. Gloria keeps pointing out to me that every week in London is like that for her. It is a mixed blessing, after all. For me, I wanted to be totally sure that I didn't waste a minute of my precious 11 days. I think that Gloria's program is planned with the same kind of thinking. They have 12 weeks, and by the end of that she will have been on many day and weekend trips, visited most of the major sites in London, seen several dozen plays, dance shows and concerts.

I was able to see enough to have a good overview of London and the other places I visited, but that is really just the beginning. Now I could go back for many more visits to begin more indepth exploration of so many places that I just saw in passing as the tour bus went by. It would be fun to live there for months at at time, as the director of Gloria's program does. Every few years she spends several months sharing what she knows and loves of London with different groups of students.

So after the week of recovering from jet lag, I had one day of feeling back to a more normal energy level, then had the bad fortune to develop a dreadful cold. This has been a particularly bad fall, so many people at work and in the local schools are sick. Some schools have actually had to close. I am part of a team of three, and we all got similar symptoms at the same time. My boss was hit harder, and was actually in the hospital with pneumonia, hopefully now on the mend and on his way home.

It worked out well that this Thanksgiving will be a smaller, quieter affair, just a few people at our house. It is just right, had it been a big celebration, it would have been hard to get ready. I am beginning to feel better, I did go to work yesterday. But I am glad to have this long weekend, even though there are quite a few activities.

Looking back.......

I have been gradually loading pictures to Facebook, and as I look at them and add captions it allows me to reflect on the trip and the places we saw. It was truly the trip of a lifetime for me. I got to see and do far more than I might have expected. It was non-stop and tiring, but I loved every minute of the trip.

My family background is very much mixed, 1/4 Irish, 1/4 German, 1/4 is a 50/50 mix of Welsh and English. The last 1/4 was in Virginia by the late 1600's, and as a result is a complete mix of English, Welsh, Scots, Irish, Dutch....... So if there is a predominant strain, it would be some Celtic combination. Because of that, I looked forward greatly to seeing England, Wales and Scotland so that I could get some sense of where I came from. What I didn't anticipate was how strongly drawn I would feel to these places, and that there would be a feeling of 'homecoming'.

Unlike most travelers, I found that the food was familiar and enjoyable. I could eat fish and chips every day or two forever I think. Mushy vegetables bother me not at all. And London in particular has every ethnic choice imaginable. In Swansea, we found one of the best Thai restaurants I have encountered. The shortbread cookies in Scotland were great, especially the ones from the Elephant Cafe (in elephant shape of course). I almost stopped drinking coffee while I was there, I loved every cup of tea. I had a cold for a few days, and found the tea to be an incredibly comforting, reviving drink. I looked forward to my morning tea and toast, especially the days at the Pickwick in London. I found the people of London to be remarkably friendly and welcoming. Perhaps there was an element of reflecting back the joy that I was feeling, but everywhere I went I found people helpful and friendly.

As I watched some of the videos in the Cabinet War Rooms, I was particularly struck by the faces of the women who were speaking - they looked so like me and my Grandmother and my Aunt Shirlee...

I liked seeing all of the places I have read about for so many years. And I was amazed to find that most of them looked like I had imagined. So often when we visit a place we have read about and seen pictures of for years, we find that it looks different from what we expect. It is smaller, dirtier, the view is blocked by something that was cleverly concealed by the camera work. That just didn't happen in this case. And places that I did not have a preconceived vision of, like Covent Garden for example, turned out to be delightful in so many ways. I am now listening to a book called 'Her Fearful Symmetry' which is set in London, and am experiencing extreme pleasure for the London details that are embedded in the book.

I am so grateful to Gloria for creating this opportunity for me, to her and Krista for their patience in traveling with me as I took hundreds of pictures and dragged my too-big bag around train and tube stations, and to my husband for encouraging me to make the trip.

Return to real life

I arrived safely back in Chicago Wednesday afternoon after an uneventful, nearly 9 hours flying time, trip. The weather was good and the flight was smooth, unlike the trip to the UK, which had some white-knuckle spells. Yesterday, we flew over the southern tip of Greenland. As we approached Greenland, we were able to see the ice floes in the ocean, it was a pretty spectacular sight. The movie selection was pretty poor. I watched The Time Traveler's Wife and after that decided it was more entertaining to watch the map than the other choices.

Today we had to get up early for Jovito's annual visit to the UIC medical center where he is participating in a research study. We were there until around 2PM. After we got home, I decided it was a good day to take it easy and do little to nothing. Tomorrow I hope to begin sorting through and labeling pictures from the trip and finish up my trip journal.

In looking back over the 11 days, I would say that I saw and experienced far more than I could have anticipated. We plunged in immediately after getting off the plane and really didn't stop at all. We were able to do a mix, that included lots of historical sites, a mix of museums, some interesting contemporary sites, train travel that gave us the chance to really see a good part of England, Wales and the southern part of Scotland, some literary sites, the beach along Swansea Bay, a lot of street performers, a mix of religious sites ranging from medieval to Georgian and a play. We experienced a variety of cuisines and spent lots of time walking. I would estimate that the least distance we covered on foot in one day was around 3 miles, the most was probably 7 - 8 miles. I learned an unbelievable amount about the history, culture, industry and people of all three countries.

There was time to get a real feel for what the city of London is like since we spent the most time there. I expected to love the history, but I was surprised at how beautiful a city it is, and how large and how densely populated it is. I was not there long enough to get over my sense of awe at how the contemporary exists surrounded by history. I am sure that with enough time, one gets used to walking by places that have been in existence for hundreds of years or more. I wasn't there for enough time for that to happen to me. I found myself still constantly surprised as I took in views that included a 1,000 year old abbey, skyscrapers, double decker busses and the London Eye, or an abbey from 1,400 AD, Roman Baths from 400 AD, a street performer on a unicycle juggling flaming torches and Ben and Jerry's. Living in Chicago where 150 years old constitutes a hugely historic building prepared me very poorly for walking among this kind of history.

I also got a real sense, especially from the Cabinet War Rooms, of how much more World War II (and World War I for that matter) touched England than it did the US. The bombing was a fact of life in London and other towns and the war touched so many people. The geographic proximity made it so very real.

Every place that we visited is worthy of longer visits, there is so much to see that we were unable to get to. But still, we got at least a taste of each place, and I am so very glad that we made the effort to cram it all in. I wouldn't have missed minute of the trip.

I intend to start to post some pictures over the weekend.

Last Post from London

The boiler in the hotel is out, and it has turned chillier outside, so it is pretty cold in here. In fact, my room is only a little warmer than outside. I am down in the common room where it is a little warmer, but I need to head up to bed soon. I have a comforter and three extra blankets, I slept under all of them last night and I was toasty warm. Hope tonight is the same.

I have packed and gotten my boarding pass, my car is ordered for the morning. I will be sorry to say goodbye to Gloria and to London, but look forward to seeing Jovito and being in my comfy house.

It was a nice last day, I used the morning to pack and relax a little, then we went to the Museum of Natural History in the afternoon. It is a good museum, hard to believe it is free. It is in an incredibly lovely old building, and the exhibits are a bit different from the Field Museum. They are both good museums, but with somewhat different points of view. We spent most of the time in the dinosaur exhibit and learned some new things from it.

I will try to post more about it later, but now it is time to go get ready for bed in my frosty room.

Spending the day in London

I had today to do whatever I chose in London on my own with just the aid of Gloria's map book and tube guide. I got up early, although not intentionally. It turned out to be another lovely London day, very sunny, although somewhat more chilly than the last few days. We have seen little of the rainy weather that London is famous for, although there may be some tonight we hear. After tea and toast, I found my way to Westminster Abbey, arriving just a few minutes after they opened. I don't think I can even begin to describe the feeling of visiting this place, some of which has been in existence for 1,000 years. It is large and lovely and ancient; but the words don't touch the experience of being in the place where so many heads of state have been crowned, where Winston Churchill, Princess Diana and so very many others have been buried. I saw the tombs of Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, Richard II, Lady Margaret Beaufort and many other royalty. Also the graves of Handel, Lord Byron, Dylan Thomas, Gerald Manley Hopkins and many other writers. I was in the Chapter House which if I remember correctly was built in 1039, and walked around the cloisters.

Although the entire facility is crowded with tourists, it is still easy to see the centuries of worshipers, the pagaents and rituals that have been enacted there. It is far larger and more ornate than I imagined it, it simply goes on and on with many small chapels and hallways. Every area is lined with memorials and tombs and graves, truly this is a place that reminds us that we are surrounded by 'so great a cloud of witnesses'. In some ways it was almost too much to be surrounded by all of that history, I wonder if one ever gets accustomed to it.

After leaving Westminster Abbey, I took tube to the Moorgate stop, which is at London Wall and Moorgate Roads. I was later told that it was the site of the Moor Gate in the wall around the original city of London. From there I walked to the Wesley Chapel, which was built by John Wesley. The house in which he lived for about the last 10 years of his life is on the site. It is a lovely old church, far different from Westminster Abbey. It is a simpler and really quite lovely Georgian church. The picture is at the top of this blog, to the left of Westminster Abbey. There is quite a contrast in the buildings and in the sites in general.

When I first arrived, there was only one other visitor in the chapel, he followed me in, possibly a stalker since he had followed me up City Road, into and out of Eat and on up the road, then into the chapel. But he left after a few minutes so perhaps I misjudged him. Or possibly John Wesley scared him off. I visited the Museum of Methodism in the crypts under the chapel, and the docent asked me if I had time to watch a 20 minute video.... so I sat on a pew that was rescued from the original Foundry Chapel and watched an interesting video about John Wesley and the building of the Chapel, then looked around the museum. Another docent took me through John Wesley's house and gave me a lovely tour. I was the only guest on the tour, so it was very interactive. I then visited Wesley's grave, which is behind the chapel.

After that I walked around a bit, then took the tube back to the hotel. I had seen a stall with some nice scarves for sale near the Russell Square tube stop, so I stopped there and treated myself to three scarves.

Gloria will be back from class in a while and we will have dinner together then I am going to the theatre with her and her group. I am hoping that my cough will abate just long enough for the play. I did catch a cold and have periods of a nasty tickly cough. I am going to get a cup of tea, it seems to quell the cough for long periods. And any excuse for a cup of tea is fine with me.

Rainy Sunday in London

Today was a little quieter day. When we woke up it was pouring rain, which made it easy to sleep a little late, but we did have to get up to get Krista off to her flight back to the states. We took a car to Paddington Station and saw her safely on the Heathrow Express. She should be well on her way by now, her flight left around 3:20. Gloria and I took the tube to Westminster and went to the Cabinet War Rooms. This is the underground bunker where Churchill and his War Cabinet worked along with other key leaders, during World War II. It has been preserved as a very interesting and well done museum, and includes a great Churchill museum as well. I had just read several books on Churchill, as well as a biography of FDR that dealt heavily with the war years. I found this to be a really interesting museum.

Then we had lunch at The Red Lion, a traditional old London pub right across from Parliament. The history in the menu indicated that this pub goes back many years (to the 1400's, although not in the current building) and was an inspiration for Dickens.

We had fish and chips, which is about the 4th time this week. I have really enjoyed indulging my British taste in food, with fish and chips, steak pie and a sort of shephard's pie made with smoked salmon. On the whole though the food is probably not a reason to come here. The history, the interesting bustling city yes. The food, not so much.

Gloria has classes all day tomorrow so she is catching up on some homework and letting me use her computer while she does the reading part. I can see that she is close to the end of her play, so my computer time will shortly come to an end.

I am back at Pickwick Hall, where Gloria and her program are housed. It is a decent hostel with a very friendly staff. I have a small single room which overlooks Bedford Place. It is a little chilly and I am just thinking about turning on some heat, but afraid of getting it overheated.

Tomorrow I plan to visit Westminster Abbey and the Wesley Chapel, and to take my time about it. I will need to meet up with Gloria late afternoon for dinner, then we are going to a play in the evening. It will be good to hae a day with a little more relaxed pace as the last week has been a whirlwind of activity.

Last night's post ended rather abruptly because my internet time was running out. So I just stopped at the end of a sentence and hit publish. Good thing I did since my screen went to a login about 20 seconds later. The fun of shared internet in a lobby of a hostel. The first night, the music was a plus but last night it was really loud.

It is hard to believe but we are back in London now, our travel week has come to an end. We are in the common room at Gloria's hotel. Krista is getting ready to leave to come home tomorrow afternoon. I still have three more days, which I hope to take at a little slower pace. We have moved so rapidly through all the places that we have been that I don't feel I have quite realized that I am really here, traveling around the UK.

After the post last night, we went on a ghost tour of Edinburgh, which started at 9:30, making it suitably spooky. The guide told us a lot of interesting stories about suicides, murders, murder/suicides, the leper hospital, hangings and why the people were hung, one contemporary story of a murderer who thought he was a vampire. I will spare you the gory details, but feel free to ask if you are interested. We went into a graveyard and saw some interesting spots, then went high up on a peak above the city called Calton Hill. It afforded incredible views of the New Town and the Firth of Forth in one direction and the Old Town and Arthur's Saddle from a different vantage point. It was somewhat scary walking up the hill, as there were not lights on the path (hence the great night view of the city) and no guard rails. But at the top of the hill, the wind was strong and it began to rain. Then instead of following the path, our guide took a shortcut, coming down a significant part of the hill on slick uneven grass, terrifying me.

After we left Calton Hill, we came to an interesting passageway called 'Jacob's Ladder'. This is one of several sets of steps leading from a street on one level to one on a dramatically different level. This particular set of steps has four or five flights of steps, quite narrow from side to side. The steps themselves are somewhat uneven. It was still raining and they were covered with leaves, making it a real adventure. I clung to the rail and held up the 20 people behind me, but I descended safely. We then hiked back up the Royal Mile to the Bank Bar where as part of the tour we got a much welcomed free pint. The bar had live music, far too loud and suffered from the overheating we have found to be common in most of the places we have been. Apparently the low 50's seems pretty cold to folks all around the UK.

I have loved every minute of the trip, even the parts where my feet hurt up to my hips. Edinburgh was the most challenging as it is incredibly hilly. I don't think there was any level ground. I couldn't properly enjoy going down hill or down steps because I knew that it was inevitable that we had to go back up. But all that aside, Edinburgh was my favorite of the places we visited. I think I would enjoy a longer visit there, with time to explore some of the places that we just touched on during this trip. And I would love to do more traveling in Scotland, there was a minibus tour that went from Edinburgh to Hadrian's Wall with various interesting sites along the way. So much to see there.... perhaps there will be another trip some time.

We got up this morning and caught a train around 9AM for London. We took one train to Warrington, then switched to what was supposed to be an express to London Euston. Unfortunately there were mechanical problems affecting the first four carriages (we were in one of them) and they stopped and all of us in those four cars had to de-train. We caught another express just a few minutes later and arrived uneventfully in London.

Soon after, we walked from our hotel to Covent Garden to shop in the market there. It is an interesting mix of upscale shops, market stalls, street performers, restaurants. While shopping at a jewelry stall we heard a string quartet, a while later we walked through an area where a tenor was singing opera, a bit later there was a man with a six foot tall dragon with about a twelve foot wingspan. I found it to be a pretty fun place, although by that point in the day we were all really tired.

We had dinner at Pizza Hut because Krista wanted to see if they were different in London. Conclusion - yes, quite different. I had a Tuscani pizza special with chicken and portobello mushrooms on a pesto base. Surprisingly good for Pizza Hut.

This morning when we left for the train station, it was absolutely beautiful. Probably mid-fifties and sunny. But in typical UK fashion, by the time we were 30 minutes outside Edinburgh, it was gray and foggy and just a little later it was raining. By the time we got back to London, it was sunny here and it seemed to be in the low sixties. It was an amazing fall London afternoon. And fun to see all the adults in some type of costume walking around, ready for Halloween.

Gloria is planning to take Krista out later tonight for a snake bite. I believe that this consists of cider, lager (which I think is American beer) and black current. I have been invited to join them since none of Gloria's friends were available to go along, so it wouldn't be too embarrassing to have Mom along. So, I guess I will take advantage of the opportunity to experience London night life (hopefully a tame example).

Tomorrow afternoon Gloria suggested that perhaps we should go to one of the places on her list that is required for her class, she has quite a few she still needs to see. I think this is quite enough.