Friends…
Remember: end of summer pot-luck at our house tonight (Sunday 9/2) at 6PM. We’ll be making SamStones as well. The food theme is ‘Garden Harvest’ so use some of that end of season produce you still have growing. Don’t worry if you need to bend the theme… any thing you bring will be fine. We’ll have a grill or two going. Please pass the winvite around. The more the merrier. Questions/RSVP at 434-3576 . Hope to see you then
-jc
Friends…
Just a quick announcement that we’ll be having an end of summer pot-luck at our house tomorrow night (Sunday 9/2) at 6PM. We’ll be making SamStones as well. The food theme is ‘Garden Harvest’ so use some of that end of season produce you still have growing. Don’t worry if you need to bend the theme… any thing you bring will be fine. We’ll have a grill or two going. Please pass the winvite around. The more the merrier. Questions/RSVP at 434-3576 . Hope to see you then
-jc
ps. My folks will be in town so come meet them !
Pss.. The rest of the day was low-key and fun. I spent most of it trying to de-virus one of our computers and trying to find a recently expired mouse that had gotten trapped in our bedroom wall. Neither fun unto itself.. but both requiring the kind of mindless concentration that I find I enjoy now. Around 2 Lou and Kathy came buy and got us out for a hike with the dogs. We went up Honey Hollow and did the high loop. It was absolutely gorgeous up there.. not many berries, though.
My folks showed up around 6. My Dad got out of the car drinking a Red Bull.. Must run in the family.
It is good to see those guys. We all went out to dinner at the Cider House in Waterbury. My Dad spent time in New Orrleans as a kid so we figured he’d enjoy all the Cajon stuff on their menu. it was a really nice meal. I really recommend the place.
We’re now home and all pretty sleepy. So everyone’s off to bed…. Lookign forward to the pot-luck here tomorrow night. please pass the invite around !
One other thing that happened today is that Deb broght aus a really nice prinnt that Hannah and Briteney had made for us… The picture took our breath away… Good night my beautiful boy…
-me
Quiet day today. I worked at home all day which was nice. I was considerably more productive and more optimistic today. Our moods are like the weather these days.. you get what you get… and you know they’ll change. One good thing about working at home is that I can do mindless manual labor while I’m on teleconferences. One big accomplishment over the past two days is that I managed to buff out the scratches in the viewing screen of my trusty camera.. the one I use for photos in this blog. That poor camera is only 6 months old.. but it looks so beat up . I’m always jamming it in my pockets with whatever else might be in there : keys, cell pones, SamStones.. As a result, the viewing screen had been scratched to the point that it was very hard to use. Someone gave me the suggestion of using a mild abrasive like Brasso to buff out the scratches.. Over several hours I was able to use a cloth with progressively finer abrasives (Brasso-> copper cleaner -> silver polish -> toothpaste) to bring the screen back to pristine clarity.. it was so cool to watch ! I was so proud of my handiwork, that I tried to get a picture of the screen … It’s hard to do. I tried with a set of mirrors.. you can’t see the screen very well.. but you can see me reflected.. ..
I couldn’t help notice the look in my eyes here.. It’s like the spark is out even as I was doing this weird and fun picture. I reflected (ugh) on that for a while…. Even talked it over with Diane. Sometimes what I’m doing.. as reflected in my life at work or around town or in this blog is not always 100 % how I’m feeling. As I’ve said in the past I do think about what I’m going to write here. I sometimes have to edit/omit stuff that’s too deep or too sad or too personal to relate in a public way like this. I hope that people understand that. Somehow writing the slightly more upbeat story here serves as a kind of therapy. I can go back and read what I wrote and view things a little bit more optimistically.. it’s kind of a bootstrap thing. Does that make sense ?
That was today’s ruminations.. I did break and had lucn with my friend Pooja who was up visitng from IBM Fishkill, BY. We had more NY friends in this evening. My friends Katherine. Kevin and their 4 boys were up visiting in VT for a week. They stopped by for dinner. We had a blast.. Their kids are all so funny. Diane made a delicious pesto dinner then we all went outside and did the male bonding activity of BSO (blowing stuff up) . In the middle there we got a quick lesson in juggling !
OK.. now to bed. Tomorrow is Diane and my 21st anniversary.. We plan to hike a mountain as has been our custom. Like all days now.. I’m sure it will be bittersweet, I will say that I’m incredibly blessed to be married to such a loving, strong and fun person. I love you forever Diane
I love my family…
-me
The whole house was a awake by 7 this morning for the first time since last June. Today was Gabe’s first day of 6th grade and we wanted to give him a good send off. I’d only been asleep for abotu 3.5 hours… but I dragged myself downstairs just after Gabe slithered down. Diane was wide awake and making waffles ! It was nice all beign together in the morning like that. It was also very different with just the 3 of us. We aer determined to make it as ‘ok’ as we can…That’s our main purpose in life right now
Note Diane’s wearing a down vest !
Gabe packed his stuff into Sam’s old High Cascade backpack, hugged Diane and off we went.
It felt kinda good being up that early (7:30).. It always surprising me that so many people are moving around at that time of the day. There were huge lines to get into the school parking lot since everyone wanted to escort their darlings to their desks.. No such treatment for Gabe.. I dumped him at the curb and sped off…. He actully seemed to be looking forward to the start of classes.
Mr. Rainey was out their Bagpiping as always on the first day ack.. it’s a nice tradition !
I went home and started to meditate.. Next thing I knew it was 10 AM . I dragged myself out of bed and started working. I had planned on taking the week off.. but after shifting my vacation to start last Thursday, I figured I should try to get 2 days of work in this week. My mailbox was crammed from being off the last four days.. so I spent my day digging through my mail and calling in to meetings . I tell you. though… it’s been very tough the last few weeks. My ability to concentrate on work is near zero at this point. It’s a surprise to me.. even though it probably shouldn’t be… that I seem to be stalling so badly now after working back to a fair level of effectivness over the summer. That lead me to an expectation of continuing to slowly build back… I keep learning that there are problems with any expectations. My main refuge now is staying rigourously in the present.. not worrying about the future or the past.. just like I had to do in the few months after Sam’s passing. The present is a nice place actually.. few worries or fears, lots going on.. and everythign that happens to you feels like a surprise.. Unfortunately it’s not that conducive to getting things done, driving strategies, makign a living, etc. I think I’m just going to have to cut back a little between now and November to keep sane….
As Punchy as I was, I did manage to make it throught the day.. I got home and hung out a while with Diane and Gabe.. Around 7:30 Bert, Angus, Chris, and Max E. came over to show us the Snowboard movie they’ve made and deadicated to Sam. It’s called ‘The ToGnar Project’ .. as in ‘totally gnarly’.. It’s really excellent.. great shooting, great editing, excellent music and trick skiing and boarding. There are lots of good ‘outtakes’ mixed in with it too.
Our pondskiminng on the raft even made it into the credits.. . The last scene it the guys picking up the flag we left on the fire tower the day we lit off fireworks with Sam’s ashes. The flag had fallen down and the guys pinned it back up… It was a great bittersweet image.
The guys are printing up a bunch of copies and giving them out to folks who doante to Sam’s Foundation. I’ll post a trailer and details on when/wher the first screening will be.. and where you can get a copy. WThese guys are just wonderful to do that. e are absolutely blown aaway by this kindness.
OK.. all for now. I need to sleep.. more tomorrow. Gnite all, g’nite Sam
-me
ps/ Diane and I were out talkign outside after the movie kids left. One of the barn spotlights blinked on at us then went out again.. even though no one was within 50 feet of the barn… Sometimes I think that stuff just has to be Sam….