We woke up early this morning, dressed quickly and headed up the hill. to Jen and Tim’s to see the Teen News segment I was supposed to be on. It turns out that the web site info was wrong and it aired yesterday up here so we missed it. It worked out, though because we were able to hang out with Jen and Tim a little.  I noticed a little statue up there holding one of the Sam buttons.

 We ended up planning a short joint vacation to Killington with them for early next week. We really wanted to get away with Gabe.. so this will work out perfectly . After that was squared away. We noticed that there was water seeping in around Tim and Jen’s  sky lights.. looked liked and ice dam. Diane, Jen and I headed up on the roof and started shoveling off the snow. It was a hoot !. There was so much snow up there.. We were up to our waists!/  It was Nate’s birthday so we sang happy birthday to him from the roof

On the way down from Tim and Jen’s Diane and I were talking about how we now measure everything as before Sam’s passing and after Sam’s passing. It’s such a different world to us now. Memories made since Nov 21^st have a much more vivid and surreal quality to them than anything that happened before. Our worldviews are so shifted now.. We both have had thoughts of just selling everything.. and doing something like travel for a year.. We’re not ready to do that yet.. but we may actually think this through and do something like that eventually.. Sam’s death has taught us that there’s no good reason to be  tied down by stuff and responsibility.

  After my short snooze. Diane, Gabe and I headed out to build a fort. After scouting out a suitable sight we spent a sunny hour or so digging out some very fine tunnels and a not very fast luge run.. The need for speed eventually caused us to abandon the snow fort and head to the sledding hill. The sledding hill was born  about  12 years ago when a truck accidentally rolled part way down the hill after slipping out of park.   The resulting  100 foot chute is the finest sledding in Jonesville. Here’s Gabe demonstrating his technique..  Nice

Once we were good and frozen, we all headed indoors for tea and cocoa. My mom called to tell me that she’d managed to catch the elusive teen news program down in Boston. It turned out to be about a 3 minute segment with me talking about next generation game processor technology. She said it was good and promised to send me a copy. I think it’s amazing that everyone (camera crews, reporters, us) all  worked so hard for a 3 minute segment.. It gives you a hint at how much work goes into building up a news program.

    The evening is winding down now.. we had a nice dinner.. Diane is putting the final touches on a really  nice letter she is writing to the folks who received Sam’s transplanted organs..  We wanted them to know something about our Sam.. We hope they write back.. but they don’t need to..  Sam.. send these folks some love for us..

-jc

 

 

I slept late this morning and woke up to bright sunshine  at 9:30.  I guess I hadn’t realized how beat I was from a week of traveling. Gabe woke up right after me and we both shuffled downstairs.. As soon as we really woke up, we started working on Gabe’s  MySpace profile (http://www.myspace.com/gabriel_the_lizzard_eater  )  to add the pictures and movies from last night’s session at Green Mountain Gymnastics We all had such a blast there   Our friend Tim arraigned to  rent the whole place for a bunch of the Bolton snowboarding kids. Each kid chipped in a few bucks and they had the run of the place for the evening. The centerpiece of the place is a large (20 x 20 ?) pit filled with soft foam blocks. You can jump or fall into it just about anyway and come out unhurt. It was amazing to see the agility and confidence of all these kids.. front flips, back flips, gainers, corks… TNext time we go I’m going to work on my back flips.  Here’s Gabe doing a ‘gainer’ and a double front flip.

     After working on the Myspace.. Diane and I spent a some time helping Max get ready for his trip back to Pratt next week. He’s been working hard on the coursework needed to finish the courses he missed last semester. He hopes to go down mid week and finish of several of his classes. I’m going to try and help him prep for his art history exam.  Art History was the only ‘C’ I ever mad in college.. so It might not be a big help.

    Around 1, Diane and I went to see Priscilla, Tim and Ivy at the Yurt at Maple Wind Farm in Huntington Maple Wind Farm  has two of these large canvas Yurt’s out on the edge of some large pastures. Here’s what they look like..

I didn’t have my camera.. so this is a picture off their web page.. Please just imagine it’s us.
    Priscilla used to be one of our roommates in the schoolhouse back in the early 80’s Her daughter Ivy and Sam were friends when they were babies. They’d just started to link back up on IBM and MySpace when Sam died. Now Ivy and I talk on MySpace.
    It was Priscilla’s ‘virtual’ 50^th birthday this weekend and they had rented the yurt to host a party tonight. I say ‘virtual ‘ birthday because Priscilla’s real birthday was November 21^st.. the day that Sam died.. They decided to move the celebration  out in time  and this was the time. We found Priscilla, Tim and Ivy sitting around the woodstove in the Yurt. it was pretty cozy in there.. though they said it had been pretty chilly the night before (- 5 F and 30 mile and hour winds).  We all coaxed ourselves outside and took a  pretty fast 5+ mile snowshoe (almost) up to Molly Starks’ Balcony. The scenery and the snow were  gorgeous. It felt so good being outside. Being out in nature makes us feel closer to Sam..  The snow was amazingly deep. At one point our friends’ dog, Stella, fell off the packed track and got stuck in the snow. Tim had to fish her out..
   After the snowshoe, Diane and I headed back home. Max and I brought in firewood.   Every time I touch the wood I remember that Sam and Mason stacked it…memories are everywhere. 
   Around 6:30 all of us headed over to Max’s girlfriend Jessie’s house for her father John’s 50^th birthday (two in a day !). We had a really nice night with Jessie’s family. They are such nice people. There were quite a few kids over there so I did a few science experiments to liven things up. I did one of my favorites which is to take a wad of fine steel wool ad crimp iit in the hook of a stretched out coat hanger. You then light the steel wool and swing the whole thing around your head.. It looks like this:

My friend Bruce once made a move that looked just like this !.. It looks even cooler standing inside the ring of fire.

   Well. I gotta get to sleep. We’re going up to Tim and Jen’s early tomorrow morning to see if we can catch the ‘Teen News’ segment I’m supposed to be on.  I’ll be talking about the technology behind video games.  I’m not sure what kind of teen would be watching TV at 7:30 AM on a Sunday which is when it will air on  Burlington‘s Channels 5 and 31. For other cites please see the schedule at   www.teenkidsnews.tv . Sam.. try to watch !

-jc

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    I’m so glad to be homeward bound again. I can’t wait to see Diane, Max and Gabe. I had a really good trip. It was wonderful seeing my sister and her beautiful family.. and I really enjoyed the brainstorming at the meeting I attended. I must confess that being surrounded by a bunch of geeks like me is one of my favorite sports. Even so, it just still doesn’t feel right being away from home yet. I can’t sleep, It’s lonely and I miss my family so much… I always missed them when I traveled but now it feels like I’m missing some part of me.. and I guess I am. Though in some way Sam’s presence feels like company in the way I talk to him, think of him and sense him. I’m stating to get lots of invites to travel again..(One of the benefits of looking like a mad scientist is that I get lots of people willing to fly me around and look absentminded. I know that I need to be very careful about the amount of travel I agree to or it will get me all discombobulated again.

    On the way home I had a chance to catch back up on a few day job discussions with folks I’ve been working with closely. I find that however muddled my mind is about the technical issues.. and my mid is still really muddled… I always have time and energy for people discussions. Since Sam died I’m finding that everyone is more open about talking about their lives with me and I love it. I was talking with my friend Pete on a work subject and he asked me about how we are all doing.  Earlier I had trouble with that question… now,  I like it. Folks sincerely want us to be ‘Ok’.. It’s sort of cute.. I get comment whenever I smile.. as in ‘you’re looking good’ .. or ‘so you’re feeling better ?’. I think it’s really hard for people to internalize that this is going to take us forever.

    Pete also asked me whether I was worried about next week being hard for us without Sam. I had to think about that for awhile. My answer was that it probably would be hard.. after all, every day is hard now. Even so, I find that I’m not worrying about the future really at all. That’s a huge change for me.. I used to spend a ton of energy worrying. At this point, I can’t project how any of us are going to feel or react at some point in the future.  If Sam’s passing has taught me anything it’s not to worry too much about any particular version of the future.. it will be here soon enough.. and it likely won’t look like you expect.  

      One thing I do hope to do next week is take it easy. I may take a few days off and hang with Gabe and Diane. I think Max is going to Pratt to do some coursework and see some friends. I hope to still get some time with him. There’s a Keller Williams show at higher ground next week which we can catch together.

     I just ran into one of Max and Sam’s old teachers on the plane he commented on how much support he saw in the community for us and for Sam. It really is amazing to us.. Sam passed over three moths ago and he’s still getting tons of  MySpace email, folks are still wearing his picture and coming by the house. ..doing stuff in his memory. Every time I see or hear of something like that it makes me smile.. I didn’t think I’d be smiling at this point..  Thank you everyone for keeping Sam’s spirit close….. and thank you Sam for keeping close to us.

 -jc

ps. Diane picked me up from the airport and we went to watch Gabe and his friends practice their flips at Green Mountian Gymnatsics. Here’s a picture of Gabe midway thorough an underflip. He’s really good !!!!!

.. and here I am doing my first front flip.

Ps. I think I’m going to be on TV this Sunday talking about why lids might be interested in video game processor technology . I did the inteview about a week before Sam’s accident . I think it’s going to run at 7:30 am on Channels 5 and 31 in Burlington.Or look at  www.teenkidsnews.tv  for your local times.

 

   

I’m still in Minneapolis at my sister Mary’s  house.  Tonight I was able to get some time to hang out with Mary, Her husband John and my beautiful Niece Ellery.    Ellery is 21 months old and is really starting to talk. She calls me uncle ‘HoHo’.. which I couldn’t figure out.. until Mary told me that’s what she call Santa .. OK.. I guess I  see the resemblance.  Mary is 8 months pregnant and looks radiant.  Here’s a picture of Ellery, the family and Mary’s very pregnant belly,

It’s good to be in this house again.  I remembered this evening that I was planning on being here right before Thanksgiving. I had been planning on surprising my parents who were here visiting my sister. They were here when we learned of Sam’s accident. Looking back, I’m glad they were all together when they heard. I called my folks tonight from here. My Mm had just sent me this picture of Sam from last summer..

I’m out here working with a client that’s in the healthcare business. I’m finding that this stuff is much more interesting to me since Sam’s accident.  It’s so cool to think that something I could be working on could be helping save lives in the not so distant future.   It’s really nice to be able to think about a completely new problem once in a while.    

     Speaking of which, I had a really good talk this evening with my friend G from IBM Canada. G’s wife passed away last May . G and I have somewhat similar personalities and similar situations at work, so I called him to compare notes on his path through healing. G told me that immediately after his wife passed away that he threw himself into his work in an effort to stay busy..  He told me that he worked himself too hard and wore himself out. In the end, he found that he couldn’t really get his head back into his job.  I’ve heard this same pattern from other folks who have gone through a traumatic loss.  I learned last week that G.  had been given the opportunity to take a sabbatical in another part of our company. It’s early, but so far he says he’s really enjoying the change of focus. It’s comforting for me to know that that kind of opportunity exists in our company if I were to need it.
     Well… tomorrow I head back to Vermont. I miss my family, I miss my house.   Diane told me that she walked into the house yesterday after coming n from a walk and the house was full of little moving rainbows..   This little solar powered electric sun catcher we have which has never ever worked spontaneously started spinning for her. Thanks for taking care of her Sam.   I love you

-jc

 ps .I got the following in the mail today from a work colleague. http://www.scottmcleod.org/didyouknow.wmv   It is pretty thought provoking. . One cool statistic in there  is that if it were a country, MySpace’s 106 million registered users would make it the world’s 11^th largest country  (between Japan and Mexico)  and.. as they say in German.. Wenn meine Großmutter Rader hatte, ware sie ein Autobus. (if my grandmother had had wheels she would have been a bus)