What would be in your user guide?
It is always helpful to be reminded of how others see you. Especially those who know you best.
All posts filed under: Family
Sunday Brunch…A Lifesaver
Last October, Candice and I inadvertently started a tradition of eating brunch out every Sunday. What a lifesaver…in more ways than one. It began as a way to get Candice out of the house after her fall. Since she wasn’t able to drive at the time, I was concerned that being home was making her stir crazy. Church was one of the initial places we ventured and that first Sunday I suggested that we add on brunch. My motives were probably less than pure. Sure, Candice would get out of the house. But I’d also get to eat great food…without having to cook! (I was doing a number of chores I don’t normally assume last fall.) Our pattern became pretty consistent. We’d begin to talk about our choices mid-week. In the process we’d check out the “best brunches” in the restaurant lists for the DC area. By Saturday, we go on Open Table and make our reservation. Candice would often study the menu and go to the restaurant knowing what she wanted. I’m not that …
Begin the New Year
For many Americans, the Labor Day weekend — not January 1st — is really the beginning of the new year. School years begin in late August and early September. Some parents — like us — have just dropped off one or more children at college this weekend. (In Claire’s case, she flew off to California on her own, but we did physically deposit Andrew in his dorm room for his sophomore year.) The somewhat slower rhythms of July and August at work, coupled with vacations, seem to be a bigger break in anticipation of starting over than the December break provides before January 1st. And this year, many Americans are just beginning to focus on the presidential race and the choice facing our country. So while Candice, the twins and I took a two-week family trip in mid-August to visit with our parents and siblings, we took the advice of those who said family trips don’t equal vacations and decided to tack on four days around the college drop-off to make sure our batteries …
Introducing Rugby (TN) to the next generation
Rugby, Tennessee, is a unique community on the Cumberland Plateau, with an incredible story of perseverance. It is also a place that means a great deal to me, as it was where my preservation career began. Today I took the opportunity to introduce Claire, Andrew, and Candice to Rugby and to show them the places that inspired me. Here’s the official story from my last post: “Rugby was established in the 1880s by the successful Victorian-era author Thomas Hughes as a Utopian community for the second sons of English gentry. Due to the system of primogeniture, these men would inherit little or no property and had very limited career opportunities. Hughes established this colony in the beautiful but hard-scrabble Cumberland Plateau area of Tennessee. After some initial success, the colony fell on hard times, ultimately failed and was largely forgotten. In the mid-1960s, residents of the area began to restore the remaining historic buildings and over the course of five decades have saved this wonderful place and turned it into a thriving community and a …
Everyone Loves a Parade
Few things top a small town parade on July 4th. Especially when the small town is Takoma Park, MD – home to one of the quirkiest and liveliest parades around. Takoma Park has – to put it mildly – a progressive bent. I’ve written about these sensibilities, and their wonderful July 4th parade, before in More to Come. So besides the obligatory Uncle Sam, the antique cars, and the politicians, this July 4th parade has a few things you’re unlikely to see in your average small town salute to liberty and independence. Like the precision grill team. Some of the entries are just silly. (This is a parade that gives out a “Wacky Tacky Takoma Award!) In the past, the Takoma Park parade has featured a precision drill team of environmentally friendly reel mowers. Those good folks were missing this year, but in their place was the precision grill team. Outfitted with their aprons, beaters, and spatulas, they marched along with the local organic food market, holding signs that asked, “You want a piece of …
The satisfaction of a well-cleaned garage
I’ll admit it right up front: it is weird but few things satisfy me like my twice-yearly garage cleaning ritual. There is a joy in realizing that you don’t really need all the junk you’ve stuck in every nook and cranny over the past six months. I like clearing the cobwebs metaphorically and physically. So I was looking forward to digging in the mounds of trash today (i.e., Andrew’s boxes crammed with junk he’d “packed” before coming home from college for the summer). Normally I do this project all by myself. I plug in the earphones, turn to the Americana playlist, get in the zone with The SteelDrivers or Tedeschi Trucks Band, and wrap it all up three or four hours later. But this year Candice said she wanted to help. Hmmm. That could be great. Or not. Candice and I had been married for 2-3 years when we began working on the first historic house we renovated together. Not knowing that much about the other partner, we decided to “share” the work. Bad idea. …
By a neck
My wife comes by her knowledge of thoroughbred racing naturally.
A Note of Thanksgiving As I Enter My 58th Year
I had difficulty getting out of bed today…the last morning wake up of my 57th year. For some inexplicable reason my life is full – on the verge of overflowing – on the eve of my 57th birthday. (I had to ask Candice, and she confirmed – when you turn 57 you are beginning your 58th year. I never was great at math.) First and foremost, Candice is wrapping up her stay in the hospital after successful hip replacement surgery on Wednesday. We head home today to continue the recovery. Both children are getting ready to go overseas (Claire by herself to Sweden; Andrew to Costa Rica) over spring break. Yikes! How did that happen? My sister texted me last night to say my father went to the emergency room with a lung infection, high enzymes, and low sodium…and the news got worse when she called to say he had a mild heart attack this morning. I just spoke with my brother and Dad just came out of surgery where they found 95% blockage in one …
Baseball in America (Academic Edition)
I have found a place in America where February baseball lives! For the Presidents Day holiday, I’m in Southern California for Family Weekend at Claire’s college. We’re new to this whole Parents/Family Weekend deal, but if today is any indication I could definitely get use to these trips! This morning, I visited two political science classes that were very interesting. One compared the works of Luther and Calvin; the other focused on the U.S. Congress. Claire joined me for lunch at her favorite dining hall (most of her classes – of the science variety – weren’t open to parents). But as she prepares for the conference championships this weekend for her swim team, I’ve found myself with choices for how to spend my time that are entirely up to me. Which takes me to Baseball in America. That’s the title of the class I attended after lunch. It was a synopsis of a fall semester interdisciplinary class that was designed to introduce freshmen to the rigors of college-level writing. Taught by a life-long Dodgers fan …
In praise of Gallagher Guitars
Gallagher Guitars have been in my consciousness – if not my life – since first putting the landmark Will the Circle Be Unbroken album on the turntable in 1972 and hearing the most famous words ever uttered about a Gallagher: Merle Travis: That guitar, by the way, rings like a bell. Doc Watson: It’s a pretty good little box — a Mr. Gallagher down in Wartrace, Tennessee made it. So I was thrilled to open the most recent issue of The Fretboard Journal and see a story and photo essay on Gallagher Guitars. Regular readers know that I eagerly await the sight of The Fretboard Journal in my mailbox. The Circle album gave me the flat-picking/bluegrass bug, and I began thinking about a new guitar. The first Gallagher I played for any length of time belonged to my long-time friend and clawhammer banjo player John Balch, who still plays his 1975 G-50 on a regular basis. It was a beautiful sounding guitar which whetted my appetite for one of my own. The first picture below …
MORE TO COME... 