And I can’t wait to get back on the road again…The life I love is making music with my friends.”
We’re at it again. Here’s Dan playing in Cherbourg, France. Abby is figuring out how to rent a car in rural Mexico. And yesterday, Rich and I flew to Chicago, grabbed a car and drove north to Oshkosh (b’gosh) to take Bud out for an A&W chili dog and root beer. That was after he took one look at his rehab dinner-”hamburger hash over rice”-and announced, “Ah! Another culinary triumph, I see!” with barely a post-stroke lisp. Actually, the food there is mostly pretty good but escaping for some fast food is a treat for him. He’s making great progress and simultaneously starting to ogle women, ala Artie Johnson. It’s funny but it’s not, you know?
Once we got past Milwaukee and made the turn off for Fond Du Lac we passed my new favorite stretch of American highway: the windmills. This is beautiful country side, rolling green farms to the left and the right- a reminder that the entire world is not a sweltering, shimmering landscape of La Cucaracha Grande. Here, for several miles there are giant (I mean, BIG ass) windmills for as far as the eye can see. They are a little eerie, in that War of the Worlds way, but very impressive.
Oshkosh itself is a lovely town and we drove Bud around a bit, admiring Lake Winnebago. At 11 miles wide and 28 miles long, it is one of the largest manmade lakes. Apparently, in the beginning, the loggers decided it would be just plain easier to flood the whole valley to move wood and they did.
We’re staying at a Hilton Garden Inn right smack next to the EAA Airventure field, billed as the World’s Greatest Aviation Celebration. During that week in July the small regional airport becomes the busiest in the world, with planes landing and taking off every 22 seconds for five days. This modest hotel is booked eight years in advance for that extravaganza but at the moment they are hosting Country USA, Oshkosh’s other big claim to fame, aside from overalls. Willie Nelson is blaring in the elevators and there are cowboy hats bobbing about in the bar, but that’s about all we’re going to see of that. This year, Oshkosh has one other limelight event that, coincidentally, they are sharing with our old neighborhood in Chicago. Public Enemies, opening soon and starring Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, was filmed one block over from us at the original Biograph Theater and then, here in Oshkosh. Oshkosh is getting ready for a big premier tomorrow, a few days ahead of the rest of the country. I’ll see it this week and maybe write a review and also a little about my family’s most infamous relative, Harry Pierpont. He was my grandmother’s cousin. Figures.
I’ll have time to post again once we get back in Chicago, with four days (hopefully relaxing for me, while Rich works, works, works) at a nice hotel. I plan to read, write, knit, walk and ride the Ferris Wheel- something I never got around to when we lived there.
Finally- that very cool sax player up front? Driving past the Oshkosh world headquarters last evening, I remembered this photo from when he modeled for Oshkosh children’s wear as a tot. Ever wistful, always special. That’s my boy.

And there’s very little shade. Okay, so that’s not here, but you get the idea.
This is here and the inside temp AC is set at 80 and it’s only 730 am in the morning. So this gives you some idea. R.L. and I did go out and celebrate our anniversary last week and then he flew off to tape a segment on the best of American high schools for a certain Sunday morning news program. Now he’s home sick. Airplane Ack is bad enough but being in a high school, an all new petri dish of germs for him, put him over the top. He’s toying with H1N1 the way a guy might, moaning and wanting me to feel his forehead often and look up symptoms on the internet. I told him it was merely travelitis and airplane ack and then, insensitive life partner that I am, I apparently slept through a 4am foray out to CVS where he got some of those dreadful multi-symptom cold pills. Now he’s passed out, perhaps for the day, and hopefully he’ll wake up feeling better.
So, stuck inside, I’m teaching needle felting classes and having great fun with that. I’m planning some specialty classes starting in August and September including a fall vegetable series and, for those wanting something a little more elegant, a nuno silk class. But I’m telling you right now, the pumpkins and squash are going to be very fine.
This is my enthusiastic class from yesterday. I love these workshops: very creative and happy atmosphere. Personally, I’m starting to move away from owls and penguins, although I do really enjoy making those. I’m working on my detailing and also going for a touch of whimsy. Rich doesn’t know quite what to make of these items perched on the mantle. Front and back. Actually, he asked, “what is that?” when I showed him the female form. “What is that?”! Either he’s sicker than I thought or it’s time for remedial therapy…
(Check out the size of that flower I cut from the yard. We have grasshoppers to match.)
(And yes. It’s a great book that just goes to show that black people, historically, have been as crazy as white people in this here South.)

The final two days were a major challenge, to clear out and leave it for the next couple in the way I would want my new home. And I guess it was a home, after all. Not the sort to spend a lifetime, but Chicago is, indeed, a magnificent city. And even more than Lincoln Park Zoo or Lyric Opera or concerts at Millennium and the best sushi ever, we made lifetime friends there. The challenge is to maintain those friendships over time and distance but I fully intend to do that.
As the moving van pulled away I saw this in front of the condo. Sometimes it’s hard to know who travels easier in this life.
Last week, I wrote that life can be so bittersweet. This photo captures what I meant precisely and I can barely look at it without crying.
After miles and weeks apart, we brought Robert up to visit Bud at the extended care facility. Laurel rescued the two cats from the isolation of Lost Loon Lodge and Bud is in a place where he is getting wonderful rehab from people who are compassionate and skilled. And yet. Bobby spent a brief several minutes pacing the parameters/perimeter of the room and then, two friends that they are, they had a good long chat. I didn’t get a picture of Bear, Laurel’s dog. We decided it was more important for this reunion first and Bear has all that happy lab energy that might be a bit much as Bud is just settling in. We’re not sure what the next step will be. LLL, much like Bud, needs some serious rehabbing but for now, it’s a step at a time for all of us.
After too many nights away from Rich, I drove back down that miserable I94 corridor to O’Hare and caught the last night flight out to Florida. McCloud expresses my sentiments exactly about being back in the bed where I belong.
I woke up to that full flush of heat and humidity that is Florida in the summer. It’s ghastly and we’re just barely into June. Nevertheless, I am now witnessing the way things grow in this tropical clime. My tree fern, on it’s third year, has gone from 1 ft to 5 ft…
The orchids and cactus hanging on the fence are all abloom…
Without being retouched, in a color only Mother Nature could dream up.
She does a good job in plain white, too.
Last night I dreamt that we forgot to pack our beautiful cherry Shaker bed and I was trying to figure out how to get it back from the new owners. I couldn’t get back to sleep for a bit but I did find this fellow hanging on the screen. I could almost make an anole cross stitch pattern out of this…but right now, I still have a few boxes to unpack.


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