Last night Diane,. Gabe , Me , Nova , Sean, Mel and their dog Pep all piled into gabe’s car.. and we drove 3 and a half hours to Bend. We have an airBNB there (with a hot tub !).. . We came down to hie Smith Rock and to see friends. Both of which we did today 

Smith  Rock is about 30 minutes north of here. Its a very cool volcanic feature that springs up out of the high desert around it. .. We did a 4.6 mile hike up and around smith rock. Its a beautiful place.. it’s also (supposedly) the place where the sport of rock climbing really took off. 

here are some pics from the day

One cool featre there was called “Monkey Rock”.. its an impressive peiece of rock. You can really see the monkey part from the side. 

All through the hike we saw rock climbers.. so cool to watch.. so spooky to think about doing it.. even thinking about thinking about it freaks my freak !

We finished our hike and drove back to Bend. We dd a little hot tub soaking. then went out for a fun browsing dinner.. FIrst we went to a dumpling place called ‘The Dump”.. then down the street to Parillas.. for the BEST EVER fish burrito !

After that we went to the Crux brewery where we met up with vermont friends Will and Paulo , Tara, Rebekkah and Connor.. Will brought his huge dog otto  too ..  

So great seeing all these friends in their home base !

Super fun way to end our visit with Gabe !

NIte all, nite sam

-me

okay we mark the day that Sam’s strong heart, liver and kidney’s helped save 4 other peoples lives.  The decision to opt for organ donation was the easiest and hardest  decision we ever had to make . We knew that Sam with his generous spirit would want that. 

Organ donation is an amazing process of matching and caring  for two people, the donor and recipient .   One of the most important components is to know what the donor would have wanted. 

you can honor Sam’s memory by having that conversation with your loved ones. Make sure they know what you would want if you are ever in that situation.. and I hope yo never will be

You can also honor Sam’s memory by giving bloo. Itoccurred to me recently is that there’s one way almost everyone can “donate life”.. Thats through blood donation. It’s one of the only ways you can donate something from yourself to save another persons life and do it again and again . The Red Cross thought that was interesting and wrote this story about Sam, Organ donation and blood donation  


We are in Oregon visiting Gabe..Today our friend Pat sent this photo and movie a friend made today of a rainbow hitting our house..   Its just the way Sam would send his love 🙂

Thank you Sam.. we love you !

nite all, nite sam
-me

Today is the day we mark Sam’s passing. It’s been 18 years since we traveled down to Florida to be with him on his last day. 

Not a day has passed since when we don’t think about him, talk about him… feel his presence.   We love our son and brother  and miss him everyday. His smile still brightens our days,,  What a fun and loving kid !
Its a sad day.. but I did more smiling than not.. 

For many of the last 18 years we’ve marked this day with a hike up Bolton and a sometimes with a potluck and samstones making. 

Over the last several years we’ve often been out of Vermont on this day. This year, we’re in Portland with Gabe.  Today we took a hike for Sam  up Powell Butte, a beautiful park on the outskirts of Portland. 

we took a quiet walk in a very beautiful place. We found a good place to drink a redbull and place a samstone.

It felt pretty good 

All through the day we heard from friends letting us know they were thinking of Sam..   We really appreciated that folks were thinking of Sam. 

One quick story about that. My friend Shmul in Israel texted me  about Sam from a Grateful Dead “Wall of Sound” festival put on to push back the darkness a little.  I thanked him and told him that Sam could play China Cat Sunflower on guitar. .. it was his favorit GD song.. Shmul immediately texted back that “China Cat’ was playing at the festival when he got my ttxt on that..   Pretty cool 


Later in the day. the three of us went out for Sushi.. a family tradition that Sam loved too.. 

Sam.. my son .  we love you and miss you every day. You will  always be with us.. I love you !

nite all, nite sam .. we love you
-me

Today it will be 18 years since Sam was hit by a car. We got the call that he’d been in an accident about 9PM.. and our lives changed forever

Earlier this day in 2006 he left us this message.. 

His last words to us were ‘Love you , bye”…    I love that

I cant believe its been 18 years.   We love and miss Sam every day.. 

Sam is still so much in our lives,.. his memory, his face..

his stories are still everywhere for us. 

For example>>> Just yesterday I was looking for a picture (which I still haven’t found) of a contraption Sam built to allow him to strum the guitar even with his arm in a cast.. that got me lookign through our thousands of pictures for e every picture I have with Sam and a Guitar..   Here they are..   

THose pictures bring me tears .. and smiles.. 

WHat ana mazing kid

We love you Sam and always will 

Nite all, nite sam
-me