We've made it to Illinois

Today we drove from near Akron, Ohio to Gilman, Illinois, which is near Kankakee, south of Chicago. We were on the road this morning by about 10 a.m., and we arrived at our motel tonight at 7:00 p.m., Central Time. We stopped at two different Casey's, a familiar place in this part of the midwest. We had pizza for lunch and leftovers for supper. We started reading a new book in the car today - I started reading it aloud, that is. It is titled American Building: The Forces That Shape It by James Marsten Fitch. It is a very interesting book. I started the trip reading David Buttrick's Speaking Parables: A Homiletic Guide. Also very interesting, in its own way. and we have a third thing we are doing, listening to a series of lectures on Understanding the Brain. Three very different subjects for sure. The book about the parables of Jesus grew out of the Pageant of the Parablss event a couple of weeks ago at the Guilford Church, and more specifically out of the sermon I preached a week ago Sunday at Guilford, a reprise of one I preached Oct. 29, 2000, about the parables; that sermon drew a great deal from David Buttrick's book, which I had discovered back in 2000. It is a very good introduction to what was then a new and revolutionary approach to the interpretation of the parables. I found a few weeks ago that I could download the book onto my computer, free of charge, so I did, and I have been reading it from the computer. The book on American Building I found in my work on Frederick Barnes Tolles, Ellen's father. I have been gathering his publications onto my computer to make a DVD that will accompany the book I am publishing about him, and one of those publications was a book review he wrote on American Building back in 1948. I read it aloud to Ellen and we both were so intrigued by the way he described the book that we decided to look for a copy, and found one used for just $7, and got it. It turns out that the book we got was a much more recent edition - 1999, not 1948! So it is not exactly the book Ellen's dad reviewed, but Fitch says that most of the 1948 book is in the 1999 edition. It was a book ahead of its time, I think, in 1948, because it was exploring the way in which the natural world, in its totality, affects the way in which humans build buildings. That is a pretty hot topic today as humans face extreme weather forces, heat, flood, fire, etc. So it promises to be a very interesting read. Understanding the Brain is a teaching Company DVD which I discovered when I was cleaning up my study - one we bought years ago but had never opened. So I brought it along. The lectures are by Jeanette Norden, a Neuroscientist on the faculty at Vanderbilt University. By sheer coincidence, David Buttrick was also at Vanderbilt, in the Divinity School. Fitch, an architect, is perhaps best known as a founder of the Historic Preservation Program at Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. So, we will be learning a lot as we drive across the country!

Prof. Jeanette Norden, Neuroscientist

Prof. David Buttrick, Biblical Scholar

Prof. James M. Fitch, architect

A frustrating couple of hours!

We are in a Super 8 Motel in Seville, OH, just west of Akron. We did not arrive until after 10pm. The problem was that (1) we needed to eat, so that I cou;d take some pills. But there were no plazas on the PA turnpike. Finally, we reached Ohio and immmediately there was a plaza with a Panera food bar. It had just what we needed, but it took longer than we expected to get the food and eat it. So by the time we were back on the road, it was almost dark and we were still an hour and a half from our motel! Then the exit onto Rte 224 wasn't where the atlas said it would be, we went out of our way, and then Rte 224 turned into I-76, which the atlas gave NO indication of. I couldn't use the phone GPS because the phone battery was dead and the charger wasn't working in the car. Ellen's phone was also almost dead - down to 10%. So we were sort of flying blind. But it all worked out and we are here. I'll post a fuller report on the day with some photos later. LATER: The Hampton Inn where we stayed in Media had a good, full breakfast, and we took full advantage of it. But by the time we got back on the road, it must have been close to 11 a.m. We drove through Media and Ellen pointed out places familiar to her from when she lived there with Julie and Paul when they were kids. It took a while to get on to the PA Turnpike and that was our route west to Ohio. But we decided to vary that a bit and took Rte. 30 for about 80 miles, rejoining the PTpk at Pittsburg. Rte. 30 took us past Shawnee State Park, where we stopped and had a picnic lunch out of our food box, and also took us by the Flight 93 Memorial, commemorating the forty passengers and crew that crashed there on September 11, 2001. We drove through the grounds, which are quite extensive, but stopped only a few minutes to allow Ellen to get cards at the Visitors Centre. It felt appropriate and sombre, not vengeful and "political," as it could have been.

The Hampton Inn and Suites in Media, PA.

The school Julie and Paul went to in Media.

Downtown Media.

The trams are sill running in Media!

Shawnee State Park Picnic.

The "Tower of Voices" at the Flight 93 memorial: containing 40 wind chimes.

The "Wall of names" - all those who died on 9/11 - in NYC, D.C. and here in PA.

We are actually on our way!

We are making our trip west! We have wanted to be present for Savanna, Katie and Brendon during the summer months, but Ellen feels okay with taking a break for almost five weeks. We would have left Friday, but I fell in my study - Thursday evening, I think. I fell hard, but fortunately I didn't break anything. My right knee is swollen, I have a very sore place in my back, and my left ankle sort of aches. I saw Dr. Van Dyke Friday - she thinks the sore place is bruised and possibly torn micro-muscles in the rib cage. Time will eventually heal, I hope. So we took it eaay Friday and Saturday. I did go see Angelina on Saturday, and I think she helped, as she usually does. We missed the Hallowell 20th Birthday Celebration, unfortunately. And we missed the Union Service in Summerston this morming, including choir. But we were on the road by 9:30 this morning, and we arrived in Swarthmore at 5:20 this afternoon. We had made arrangements to meet Sarah, Harry and Wallace at Swarthmore Pizza at 5:30, so we made it with a few minutes to spare. It was wonderful to see Sarah and Wallace again - I had not seen them for some time. Harry has visited us, but I have not gone with Ellen in her recent visits to Swarthmore. The restaurant was pretty noisy, so conversation was not easy, but we managed.We will be on our way to Chicago in the morning.

The Mario Cuomo Bridge - formerly the Triboro Bridge.

Wallace and Sarah.

Harry and Ellen.

Our Mediterranean Pizza

Interior of Swarthmore Pizza

A cute little welcome.

Rocks and Parables

Sunday, I told the children's story and gave the sermon at Guilford. Fred Breunig led the rest of the service. This service grew out of the "Pageant of Parables" two weeks ago - I had shared with Sue Owings a service and sermon I gave on October 29, 2000, at Guilford, on the meaning of Jesus' parables. The basic thrust of the sermon was that Jesus' parables probably had a different meaning when he told them than the one they were given in their setting in the gospels, and that originsl meaning was often surprising and even revolutionary - pointing to the realm of God that upsets our accustomed social order. The children's story was a "parable" I created out of an incident that had happened at my house that year - 2000 - when Eddie Clark was building a new stone wall. It was about a big rock he wanted to put into the wall. I tied that in with the parable about the two men who build a house in a dry stream bed (crazy!), one on sand, the other on a rock. Here is the story: Eddie's Big Rock My story this morning is about a rock. A very big rock. This is a true story - it took place 23 years ago at my home in Dummerston. My house was built in 1973 - 50 years. ago - into the side of a hill, and there is a stone wall by the house that keeps that hill in place. In the year 2000, 27. years after the house was built, that wall needed rebuilding, and I hired a well-known and very fine wall-builder to do the work - Eddie Clark. If you look outside the church here you will see some very fine stone walls Eddie Clark built here as well. To appreciate this story you need to know a couple of things: (1) My first wife was Shirley, and she was minister of. this church for 22 years and died in 1998, just two years before this story took place. Eddie Clark was very fond of Shirley and I think Eddie felt that Shirley was a saint. - that is important for this story. (2) The other thing is that Eddie used a. backhoe in his work - do you know what a backhoe is? It is a machine that has a long arm, and at the end of that arm is a kind of jaw that opens and shuts and you use it it dig holes and trenches or to pick up things and put them somewhere else. To rebuild my stone wall, Eddie used a lot of rocks that were right there, and he found one in particular that he wanted to use. It was partially buried near the stone wall, but the part that showed above ground looked good. so he dug it up out of the ground with his backhoe so that he could see all of it - and he liked it. It was perfect - just what he needed for the end of the wall. The trouble is that it was big. Bigger than any other stones in the wall. More like a boulder. And he had to be able to pick it up with the backhoe and carry it over to the wall and set it in place. So he tried. But every time he picked it up with that jaw on his backhoe, he would just get it up and it would slip out and fall back onto the ground. He tried several times and failed again and again. I was right there watching, and I could feel his frustration. Then he did something I did not expect: He called out, and said, "Shirley ,help me get this stone into that wall. This is for you!" Then I realized that for Eddie, this was not just any old rock. This was like a memorial for Saint Shirley! So he tried again, and this time, he picked up that huge stone, swung the arm around, drove over to the wall and set it in place, slick as a whistle! Wow! Ever since, when I drive up and look at that stone, I think of Shirley. Here is a picture of it as it looks today.

Shirley's rock, featured in the story, as it appears today.

Standing by the altar - Ellen created the bouquet on the altar

Telling the story of "Eddie and the Big Rock," with Fred Breunig holding the microphone. I used the rock on my knee to illustrate the story.

Music, Music, Music!

When we were in Maine last week, I spent one full day, Wednesday, August 16th, with Phil. Ellen was with me much of that time, but not all. We started out going with Phil to "Bach for Breakfast" at the Camden Public Library Amphitheatre. This was part of the Bay Chamber Screen Door Festival Series, and featured Bridget Kibbey on harp and James Austin Smith on Oboe. These two musicians played music by J.S. Bach which had been transcribed from other instruments. Specifically, they played Sonata in C Major, BWV 1033, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, BWV 565, Selections from French Suite in G Major, BWV 816, Sonata in E-Flat Major, BWV 1031. The Toccata and Fugue - for organ- was particularly demanding on the harp. We did not eat breakfast there but coffee and baked goods were available. The amphitheatre is a delightful spot, and they had ercted a large tent for this event - you can't play the harp in the rain!

Photos: Top: the amphitheatre as it looks when there is no tent; next: Bridget Kibbey playing the harp (from a video on her website): next: James Austin Smith playing oboe at the Fest; next: Bridget Kibbey playing at the Fest; next: Listeners under the tent; bottom: Phil taking a picture of the concert. **************** After the Bach for Breakfast concert, I went inside the Camden Public Library to use their rest fsacilities - a very nice library! I could have spent the rest of the day just exploring it! But we had to move on to the next concert. At 1:00p.m., there was a jazz concert in a nearby public park. But we needed to eat. So we walked toward the park and went by the Camden Deli. I sat outside and people-watched while Phil and Ellen went inside and got sandwiches and drinks. Then we walked on to the park - walking is good for me - and found a picnic table there. Perfect! The jazz band was a six-member group: two saxaphones, cello, guitar, bass and percussion, playing very gentle jazz, songs by, e.g., Herbie Hancock, and somewhat reminiscent of Dave Brubeck in their style. It was very enjoyable sitting there under the trees in the shade, enjoying the music. A woman we didn't know approached the table and asked if she could join us, and we said, "certainly." She proved to be interesting, though after eating my sandwich, I left the table and sat in a canvass folding chair that Phil had brought for me, because it was more comfortable - I miss having back support at a picnic table. But Ellen said she was someone she could imagine having as a friend. She obviously was very involved in Camden civic life.

View of Camden Harbor from the Public Library.

Camden Deli sidewalk sign.

The jazz combo in the park. ****************** After the jazz concert, Ellen went on to Jim and Mary's to be with them and Katie and Brendon, and I went with Phil back to Friendship. We had been invited to have supper with Phil's neighbors in Cushing, John and Karen. Karen had prepared lasagna, bread and salad, and we just had time to do a couple of errands, go back to the cottage to freshen up, go to John and Karen's for a quick supper, and then go on to a third concert at the Strand theater in Rockland, with Karen joining us, but not John (who seemed not to be feeling quite up to snuff). Ellen joined us there just before the concert began. This concert was sponsored by the Salt Bay Chamber Festival. It featured a Mohawk woman, Dawn Avery, composer, whose work Iethi'sotha Ahsonthehnêhka Karâhkwa, "Grandmother Moon," for string quartet, was being given a world premier. It was an unusual and powerful work. The composer gave a little talk about the work. Also on the program was Ottorino Respighi's Il tramonto, for mezzo-soprano and string quartet, and Dvorák's String Sextet in A-Major, Op. 48. The Strand Theater is not huge, and we had seats in about the fifth row, center, ao the sound was full, warm and intimate, and the music was well-played. Pretty close to Marlboro, I would say. Three concerts in one day, and very varied in their repertoire. So this was a full day for me, and I held up well. I enjoyed my day with Phil very much, and we had a chance for some good visits in the car. After this concert, I went back to Friendship with Ellen, where we spent the night at the cottage. ******************** Friday, Ellen and I went to Jim and Mary's and we spent time there with everyone. Ellen went to the Transportation Museum with Katie and Brendon, and I stayed at the house and worked on my sermon for Guilford, where I was preaching Sunday. We ate at Rustica, an Italian restaurant in Rockland, but something about the shrimp and polenta appetizer set my stomach on edge - maybe too much butter and garlic? - and I couldn't eat my eggplant parmigiana entré. We went back to Owl's Head and played cards- the game of Oh Hell! which is sort of like bridge except that your hand starts with ten cards, and then with each subsequent deal, has one less card, all the way to one card. You bid the number of tricks you think you can take, and if you make your bid, you get 10 extra points. It's fun, and I won the game! *********************** Ellen and I spent one last night at the Friendship cottage, had a final breakfast with Phil Friday morning, and came home - through heavy rain part of the way. We stopped at When Pigs Fly for bread andBob's Clam Hut for food. Saturday, I worked on the children's story ("Eddie's Big Rock") the the Guilford service, and fine-tuned my sermon. Saturday evening we went toanother concert - A "Music Under the Stars" concert sponsored by the Brattleboro Music Center and held outside at the Retreat Farm. It featured Keith Murphy, Becky Tracy and friends, all familiar, and wonderful music from Qurbec, New Brunswick and the folk tradition. It was a perfect night, cloudy, so no stars, but a lovely temperature and a large crowd, some of whom we knew.

Right to left: Keith Murphy, guitar; Becky Tracy, fiddle, and their friend, Rachel Bell, accordian.

The stage at the Retreat Farm

Part of the large crowd there.

A trip to Maine

I have a lot of catching up to do. A week ago today we went to the final concert at the Marlboro Music Festival with Susan and Christian, and I posted about that. A great deal has happened since then. Monday, we went to Maine to join Katie and Brendon, and Jim and Mary for a restorative time for the Tolles siblings after Savanna's death. Katie and Brendon had gone to Maine on Saturday to stay in a little cottage, what Brendon called a "tiny house," which was in fact a manufactured house on wheels sort of permanantly set up on the shore of Damariscotta Lake. They had "won" three nights in this cottage in a silent auction at First Church, Amherst, a few months ago. They were still there on Monday afternoon when we went to Maine, so that was our first stop. It was actually quite nice: a lovely setting, and though admittedly small, quite attactive and well-designed. Brendon got the one bed and Katie slept on a comfortable couch in the living-room. We were there for only about a half-hour but got a quick "tour" and a short visit, and then went on our way to Friendship, ME, where Phil McKean was hosting us in his family cottage, 120 years old, called "Vistamont."

Katie and Brendon's "Tiny House" cottage in Damariscotta: front of cottage, living-room, kitchen and hallway, bedroom, view from the deck.******************************* The reason for our not being at Jim and Mary's house was that Katie and Brendon were leaving their tiny house on Tuesday and going to Jim and Mary's themselves, and there isn't room for all of us there. So we asked Phil if we could stay with him, and he graciously said yes. His cottage in Friendship is only about a 15-20 minute drive from Jim and Mary's, so it makes it fairly easy to go back and forth. It wasn't just us and Phil in Friendship - Phil's nephew, Mac Jacob, and his wife Susie, who live in Michigan, were there also. That cottage, which was built around 1900 by Phil's grandfather, is actually owned today by Phil's two children, Tom and Susannah, and Phil's sister, Ruth Jacob's three children, of which Mac is one. It can sleep as many as twelve I think, maybe more. We were on a sleeping porch that had two double beds. Unlike the "tiny house" in Damariscotta, which has sort of a generic quality, the Friendship cottage has a classic Maine ambiance. That is due not only to architecture, but also to the furnishings and especially to the "art work" that adorns the walls: magazine covers and clippings, amateur water color paintings, family portraits and photos, etc., plus numerous sail-boat mobiles made by Phil's dad (I think), hanging from the ceiling. Here are some pictures:

Family portraits and photographs.

The living-room.

The exterior of the cottage.

Tom Maclachlan's birthday and a Corn Boil

Going back a bit, on Saturday, John and Cynthia picked me up at our house at about 10:30a.m., and we drove down to Goshen, MA, which is about twenty minutes west of Northampton. There is a direc route there which was a bit over an hour from our house. Tom and Courtney have a cottage there, and it was Tom's 80th birthday, which happened to coincide with a community event - "a corn boil," i.e., a picnic meal featuring boiled corn-on-the-cob, hot dogs, hamburgers and salad. The "boil" was a short walk from their cottage, and Tom's two children, Kate and Alec, and their spouses and children were all there, plua quite a few of Tom's colleagues and friends. There was a little community hall near the "boil" where there was a birthday cake and after eating we gathered there to sing "Happy Birthday," eat cake, and take pictures. It feels like that was another life now, after all that has happened since. But a great deal has happened in the last two months or so. Change and trauma seem to have become the norm!

Top: Tom serving his birthdaay cake. Middle: Tom and Courtney with their children, Alec and Kate, plus their dog, Henry. Bottom: Me with the family, including spouses and grandchildren.

The final concert

Susan and Christian made it possible for us to attend the final Marlboro concert. It was a varied concert: an Alban Berg String Quartet, Two songs by Adolph Busch, a Brahms Horn Trio, and the Beethoven Choral Fantasy, which involves a chorus, orchestra and soloists. It was a beautiful afternoon. We all went to the Guilford Church that morning - a very special service which was the last one led by our current pastor, Elisa Lucozzi, who is leaving. What could have been a very difficult situation was handled with grace and dignity. We went to the Guilford Country Store for lunch, and then drove up to Marlboro. Then after the concert, we came back to the house and Christian did some more work - he had three major projects at our house: (1) stacking wood; (2) Repairing the screen door that the bears damaged and (3) repairing a broken arm on our rocking chair. He finished all three! What a tremendous help! I would include pictures of all three, but I'm not at the house right now. We visited in the evening and got to bed in good season.

our seats at the concert were under the canopy attached to the side of the concert hall. We could hear the music through open screened doors along the wall. MONDAY MORNING we said our goodbyes and Susan and Christian went on their way to points east in their itinerary, which includes Cape Cod, Maine and northern Vermont. We packed up for our trip to Maine and got on the road after noon. We stopped by the "tiny house" where Katie and Brendon were staying on Damariscotta Lake - something they got through a silent auction at First Church in Amherst. It was very nice - a little house on wheels, very well-designed and in a lovely location. Katie, Ellen and I went out for pizza supper at "The Penalty Box," a pizza and pub on Business Route 1 in Damariscotta, near Round Top Ice Cream, where we often stop. Brendon didn't want to come, so we left him at the tiny house, but Katie brought a lot of pizza back to him. Ellen and I went on our way up to Friendship - to stay with Phil McKean in his cottage in Friendship, ME, not far from Owls Head. We will all gather at Jim and Mary's on Tuesday, which is where I am right now as I am writing.

Scenes at the tiny house.**************
The McKean cottage in Friendship is over 120 years old and was built by Phil's great-grandfather. Obviously, there is a lot of family history there. It is a classic Maine summer cottage. It now is jointly owned by Phil's two children - Tom and Susannah - and his sister Ruth's three children. One of them - Mack Jacob = was there when we arrived, along with his wife, Susie, and Phil himself. We had a nice double bed on a sleeping porch with lots of fresh ocean air. A good night for sleep. This morning we came to Owl's Head and Katie and Brendon just arrived a bit ago. They are all taking a walk. *****
Meanwhile, some very, very difficult things are happening in Cynthia's family. There is really nothing we can do to help, and I hope that it will somehow not be too traumatic especially for John and Cynthia.