Hoping you are having a wonderful Thanksgiving

We want to say Happy Thanksgiving to you all!  And it’s time to bring you up-to-date on our wanderings.  But, mostly we really want to share our big heart-felt gratitude not only for the life we are blessed with, but for each of you.  This is one of the few times we have spent Thanksgiving with just “us two” and it’s fun.  But being away, in the hills of Northern New Mexico, all by ourselves is making us think of how many rich connections we have and how great it is to have all of you in our lives.  Thank you for being who you are!

At the end of October we finished our wonderful summer volunteering at the Ford House in Mendocino – what a blast we had!  Susan telling people where to go! And David telling story after story about the history of the house, the town and the redwood industry.

We went from Mendo to Petaluma for a weekend at the IONS campus and while settling in for a session on Saturday morning Susan, taking a very long step up on a seating platform, heard a really loud pop and was in amazing pain in her left knee.  Long story short, she is scheduled for anthroscopic knee surgery on Dec 23^rd .  The pain has subsided – it comes and goes - she’s on a cane instead of a walker, but the MRI showed that the meniscus is torn apart and needs a good vacuuming out.

We drove the motor home to Portland where the Goldens were meeting us and retrieving the rig (saving us the drive to Pt. Townsend), but we left before they arrived so that we could get to Santa Fe and a doctor’s appointment asap.

On our way to New Mexico for our 4 month house-sitting gig, we stopped in Salt Lake City to hug Sutton and John and to visit our clothes in the small storage unit that holds all of our belongings.  We drove on to Santa Fe and spent several days there before heading up to Medanles where we will be until mid March. 

We had a nice dinner and spent the next day with Roberta and David McCleary, owners of this house on top of a mesa in an area called Vista de Pedernal – and it really is!  Georgia O’Keefe must have painted the Pedernal hundreds and hundreds of times and when we look out the living room window – there it is!  The McClearys are now “jeeping” in So. California for the winter. To get to the nearest store, in Espanola, we have to drive 2 miles down a dirt road then another 8 miles – WalMart  is about our only choice for food shopping unless we continue on about 30 miles to Santa Fe....but, it is beautiful here.

Although this is not a Chirstmas letter, we are reporting that Payson Cooked today! – an amazing event!  And John and Sutton went to Sutton’s 90 year old grandparents home to dine with family (Grandma played the piano!).  All is just perfect!

So, there you have it – we’re here until mid March, and then have no idea what we will do with ourselves….we’re open to ideas, so give us a shout. Thanks to Vonage our old phone number - 520-326-1894 - works just fine here (though the cell phones don't)   Many hugs and much love!

Have you ever bent a spoon?

We had a great trip south last week, had 3 nights in a hotel room twice the size of the motor home and slept in a king-sized bed!  Got all frozen up by our new dermatologist - Rosie Chattha; had a terrific lunch with Cassie Vieten (the head of research at IONS) - boy, is she ever so smart! Saw my great Dr. Joe who is fixing a stubborn shoulder and neck, and did a spoon bending "Star Party" for the Libras at the very very beautiful IONS campus in Petaluma.  Nearly everyone at the party was able to bend their spoon using  the "Jack Hauck" process:  1.  Concentration and calling in the energy of the Universe 2.  Setting intention and 3.  Letting go and letting the Universe do its thing.  This was the first time that I tied a fork and spoon together - take a look!

Many people will tell you that this spoon bending thing is a "magic" trick - and, I suppose it is if you consider your own "power" to be magic.....it was fun....try it some time, if I can do it, so can you!!  Call me and I will coach you through the process - the larger the group, the greater the success it seems....

We are still stunned by the trees - this one made me put on the brakes and stop right in the middle of the road - it is huge and is on the way to Judith Bayer's house (she is THE world's greatest acupuncturist and a really neat woman to boot).  I rushed home and got David so he could stand in front of it.  Amazing, no??

We are getting ready to welcome Angela Murphy and beau Mark this weekend (Angela works at IONS) and is one delightful person...and, we 4 are invited to a really traditional tea ceremony at Shirley Freriks' house on Sunday!  We are working at the Ford House on Fri and Sat this week and next then are done - wow - this summer really flew by.  We will be at the IONS campus to experience the World View Literacy Program the weekend of the 29th then will drive up to Portland to meet the Goldens - do the "Passing of the Keys" to the motor home ceremony then will head to Salt Lake City to change out clothes, hug John & Sutton and off to Abiquiu we go to spend some time with  Georgia O'Keeffe (niece Patricia recommended "Full Bloom:  The Art and Life of Georgia O'Keeffe" by Hunter Drohojowska-Philp which we bought and I have just started).

BTW - "Eat, Pray, Love" is a delight and so is the book...  I highly recommend it!  Hugs to you all!!

WOW! More than a month has passed since our last post so this one is LONG...

Our daughter Payson and her Significant Other, Chris, flew from NYC into SanFran a couple of weeks ago and we used their arrival as an excuse to spend several days in the city - boy, do I love that town!  Once they arrived we spent that day and the next in town then drove up to Santa Rosa, showing them our "haunts" in Marin and Sonoma, then had a great week with them here in Mendocino...on our way to Bowling Ball beach Payson slipped and hurt her foot which curtailed the hiking a bit... so, .we did.the Skunk Train, http://www.skunktrain.com/ ,

Open car on the Skunk Train

 drove thru an ancient Redwood tree on The Avenue of the Giants http://avenueofthegiants.net/ ,

It's our Honda coming thru the tree

 walked thru the ancient redwood trail at Bull Creek in Rockefeller Forest, spent time at the Botanical Garden and on and on...

Chris, Susan & David on the Bull Creek Trail

Last week we had a delightful visit from Ed Gelardin (retired psychiatrist who does mentoring of new psych students at the Univ of Arizona and is an IONS fan) and his brother Bob (lives in Marin, lucky guy!!).  They made the 3 hour drive up the really windy, curvy roads from Marin to Mendo (we often ask this chicken and egg question - are there no decent roads to Mendo because there are no people here, or are there no people here because there are no decent roads - my vote is for the latter 'causes it is beyond beautiful here).  they arrived after lunch and we immediately went to our 5 star, amazing botanical garden in Fort Bragg where the begonias are the size of your head

and the dahlias are in bloom.

This Garden is one of only 2 in the US that is on the ocean.  And, it is just wonderful.  We had a great dinner at the Mendocino Cafe, they walked the headlands the next morning and we said goodbye in the Ford House after telling them everything we have learned.  Here are Ed and I in the gardens....it was really fun, and special, to have him here...

 
Yesterday we spent the day visiting other museums in "the area" - that makes me laugh because everything is really far from everything else and, I can't say it enough, on very curvy, roller-coaster roads. We headed out for Willits on Rt. 20 for the Mendocino County Museum http://www.co.mendocino.ca.us/museum/ - that's 33 miles and an hour away.  When Payson and Chris were here a couple of weeks ago we drove back to the coast from Willits at night trying to make Ft. Bragg before the restaurants all closed - that was an experience for them that I bet they won't soon forget.  From that museum we drove down 101 to Ukiah (Haiku backwards) to the Grace Hudson Museum http://www.gracehudsonmuseum.org/.  Both tell stories about the wreck of the Frolic (why Jerome Ford came here in 1850-51 seeking his fortune, but finding Pomo Indians wearing silks and eating from Chinese porcelain plates, but that's another story, I digress) and about Grace Hudson's amazing paintings of the Pomo Indians which, from an anthropological point of view record much history and and and....   The drive back - only about 50 miles from Ukiah - took well over 2 hours.

We watched the sun set over the ocean and the moon rise over the hills and welcomed Fall last week - it was just spectacular and awesome.  We are just so very, very fortunate!  Hugs to you all.....

Our Next Move

We thought that we and the motor home may just turn into pumpkins on Halloween, but it is not going to happen.   We are driving out of Mendocino on October 30!

Beginning on or about November 17th, we will be house sitting in Abiquiu, New Mexico until March 18, 2011!!!  And, getting there from here will be fun - we are going to take our time going north (not much choice given the roads) but have committed to meeting the Goldens in Portland on the 8th of November when they will reclaim this wonderful little rig and take it on home to Pt. Townsend.  They are planning an extended trip this winter - Jim is retiring at the end of the year!!


From Portland, we will drive to Salt Lake City and have a visit with Sutton, John and with the clothes in our storage space.  All those summer clothes will continue to reside in SLC (we don't have them with us now as Mendocino is very, very cool - all summer long I don't think that we've seen a time when the temp rose to 75 - I had to order more turtlenecks).  We will need winter jackets, gloves, hats, etc because it's going to be a cold but sunny winter in Abiquiu which is about 45 miles north of Santa Fe. The house is on the top of a mesa and was built just a few years ago - the heating runs through the floors so it will be toasty.

We'd love to have visitors - although there is not an option for anyone to stay with us in the house, there are BandBs and other kinds of accommodations nearby and there are full hook-ups on the property.  The owners, Roberta and Lorin McCleary are very helpful and have all sorts of information to make our stay interesting and educational - we are happy about this situation.

We will make some decisions about what to do after March 18th, but very high on the list is a trip to Europe to volunteer with Pueblo Ingles in Italy and in Spain - we so loved our time with them a couple of years ago that we are going back for more....we are talking about spending time in Italy, Spain and France and then going to Scotland for an extended time, but who knows - these plans could all go out the window when another option presents itself for consideration....ideas??

We are learning how to live without plans - trying to stay in the NOW.....it's not as hard as we thought it would be. Although Susan spends time searching for interesting possibilities it is as much for fun as it is for planning.... 

We're in the wine country

First, I received this link from a friend and have to share it - it contains important information for anyone who drinks wine.

http://www.wimp.com/wineshoe

We are at the north end of the Alexander Valley wine region and there are more than 50 wineries within 50 miles of our location in Mendocino....we are working our way through them and they are beautiful! It is amazing to see the miles and miles of vines and the beautiful tasting rooms along Rt 128....from now on it is a requirement to take shoes, just in case.

I am attaching a picture of our motor home which, as you can see is parked next to our deck! And we've planted a bit of an herb garden....with so little sun it is amazing how it is thriving,,,, with the exception of the tender mint basil....you can also see our "curtains" in the front window. We put these up (using the "summer" drapes (read sheets) from our bedroom in Tucson)so that we wouldn't have to open and close the "real" drapes in the rig (they are 10 years old and we wanted to reduce the wear and tear (haha) on them).  Pretty fancy!

We continue to explore the parks - hiking the 2 mile trails and working our way up to the 3,4,5,6.....mile trails - there are so many options and so many trails that it is hard to decide where to go.  Right outside the Ford House door there are opportunities to walk the headlands and to get onto the beach!

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=442

The biggest news is that we have found the most amazing pizza ever and it is gluten free - just up the road (about 10 miles) in the Ft. Bragg bakery....they only are open from Wed thru Sun and it's a very good thing - you might have guessed that David is absolutely addicted.

Hope all is well with all of you.....With many hugs, S&D

It's still July....the Music Festival is terrific

Forgetting What You Didn’t See

One day last week I had two people say unintended funny things I’d never heard before.  Each one requires a brief story.

First, while volunteering in the Ford House (the visitor center in Mendocino) I got to talking with someone about Glass Beach, which is at the north end of Fort Bragg, the next major town north of Mendocino.  It seems that the site of Glass Beach was a nasty dump, but it was cleaned up a few decades ago.  The broken, sea polished glass is all that remains, and it makes the beach a destination.  We even have a book for sale at the Ford House that tells the story of the dump and how people finally did the right thing.  One interesting point mentioned in the book is that certain colors of the glass are more rare than others, especially blue and purple.  We speculated a bit on what might have been the source of such colors, and my co-conversationalist suggested incisively that blue was probably from the “milk of amnesia” bottles!  (Maybe that’s what you take when you just want forget about the intestinal distress?)

Later in the day I went out to take a look at the work being done to build a tent next to the Ford House for the upcoming Music Festival (see above).  The huge tent (16,000 square feet) was about complete, and on this day most of the work had been devoted to assembling the large stage.  As I looked down the inclined field toward the tent with the stage at the lower end, I really thought the stage was pitched toward me, but I wasn’t sure.  So I turned to ask one of the workers sitting at a picnic bench nearby about it.  “Is the stage level?” I asked.  He answered yes, it was.  I went on to say that it sure looked like it was pitched, but he said no, that it was really just an “optical delusion”!  Meaning you fooled yourself into seeing it?

It is possible that they really didn’t say what I heard, but this is way funnier I think!  Or are we just getting too old to know what in the world is going on.....

BTW – Yesterday we sat for a couple of hours in the big tent listening to a really good big band rehearse for their Music Festival performance, and we just loved it.  The really special treat was a young pianist, who we thought was just fantastic.  Turns out he is only 22, and the son of the band leader and the classical pianist who founded the festival.  His name is Julian Waterfall Pollack (his mom is Susan Waterfall), and he is making a splash (no pun intended) in the NYC jazz world.  He has a new album, Infinite Playground.  Check it out!

The Music Festival draws folks from all over the world - performers and attendees....some famous, some not......been going on for 23 years and there are, on average, 3 performances each day for 20 days - it's really amazing for this town of 900 residents!!! There is a theater, many art galleries, a wonderful art center and on and on...."unique" is not even in the running for a descriptive.

 Up dating the day-to-day....

We were in Reno, NV this past week getting a new license plate for our 2000 Honda and new drivers licenses - had to make this hurry-up trip as the bank wouldn't allow us to open an account, all of our addresses didn't match and we don't have any utility bills (whoops) - me thinks they were suspicious that we wanted to launder money.... when, really all we wanted to do was to launder our dirty clothes and that's another story - it's at least 8 miles to the closest laundromat.

Mendocino is super - foggy much of the time, but when the sun comes out the blue blue sky and the blue blue ocean become one...the trees are awesome, some the height of a 20 story building and more....and the green, the green makes you weep.

The Fourth of July in this really small town (pop. 900) drew tons of people to the parade - we were "on duty" at the Ford House all morning then at about noon we locked the door and went outside to help with the hot dog sale (we sold 400 - quite the feat given the resources) until the parade started at 1:00.

People had been parking their pickups and flat beds and putting out their folding chairs on Main Street all night and in the morning brought kegs of beer and other party paraphernalia along with with grand parents, kids, cousins and friends to take their places.  We had been told that in past years there were times when the parade went around twice, but this year it only happened with one float - the nastiest one in the parade - covered in sea weed with dancing girls wearing bikinis that they had tucked sea weed into - came by smelling worse the second time than the first.

The band was terrific, wearing all sorts of hats and other garb....the party went on all afternoon on the Kelly House lawn (another period building) and we went back to greeting people and telling them where to go and what to do and all about the history of the Ford House and the start of the lumber industry - we do tell them about the remorse that was felt by some of the men who found and cut down the thousand year old redwoods - but those guys were few and far between.  We are lucky that some state and national parks were created to protect some of these great-grandfather trees - they are so very amazing!

A few pictures of the parade follow.  Note that there are causes (like the salmon) here that you don't find everywhere.  Also note the water tower in the background across the street from the Ford House - the water table was high, the wind was heavy enough to make the windmills turn - they pulled water up into the tanks on top of the towers and gravity supplied running water to the houses - there were many, many of them in Mendo in the late 1800s!! today they are used for all sorts of things - like guest houses, galleries, etc.