We had a day of several goodbyes. This afternoon we went to our friends Sandy and Michael’s for an informal memorial celebration of Sandy’s father Gunter. He died last week at ag 87. He was such a great guy, funny, even tempered and out dorsey. He was an engineer.. perhaps the first one that I really knew ! He was born in Hamburg Germany in 1925 and even served in the German army as a very young man in WW II. He managed to escape from a Russian prison camp and made his way to the US. Gunter and his family were a few streets down the road from us in Houston. I spent many hours over there just hanging out.
I went and visited him in at the assisted living apartment he had in Barre a few months back. It was his birthday .. it was great hearing him take calls from friends all over the world alternating in german and english. I left that meeting thinking about what a conteded guy Gunter has always been.
It was a nice gathering for him today.. we told stories and looked at pictures, and generally caught up with each other.. Sandy’s brother ron and his partner Green were there which was a treat.

Just as we got there, Sandy went to the table with Gunters things and handed me this.. it was Gunter’s slide rule.. She wanted me to have it.. how cool is that ?

We’ll all miss you gunter. happy hiking wherever you are now..

 

From Sandy’s in Middlesex we headed back to Underhill. Our friend Dana is leaving soon for a year fellowship in Armenia

She’s pretty fluent.. but studying up on her armenian just to be safe..

While in Armenia she’s going to be doing something with folk art.. She’s a wonderful artist.. Dana and Peters house is full of dana’s work.. like this one peice she did as part of a series around her mother’s struggle with alzheimer’s .. (she called the series aliceheimers)

Here’s a painting of neurons from the brain.. .. on the same topic

 

The first part of the party was a 90 minute yogic chanting session lead by fletcher and her harmonium. it was really cool.. lots of Ohmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmms

Got us all mellowed out for the party.

Dana and Peters kids and their friends coordinated the feats.. Mostly indian food.. really, really good. We all toasted Dana and wished her luck and fun on her trip

After dinner. Peter’s band Lokum played soem awesome Armenian and other central european and middle eastern music At one point peter  and the band played and sang a song that Peter’s written for Dana for her trip. He’s staying here for most of the time, but hoping to travel over to be with hjer for at least half of the time. I like seeing how much they love one another.

One interesting thing today.. at both events we met people that we hadn’t known before.. That always  makes the topic of Sam’s passing come up..I liked talking about him… I always do..

Speaking of goodbyes.. I gottta go.. I’m heading to mexico for a few days tomorrow for work. More from the road..

Nite all, nite sam

-me