From the road...

(Written on Thursday, June 28)

Riding on I-70, headed eastward. Crying as we drove over the Missisippi, because I had just put in a disk in the computer and discovered that it worked. It was a disk of photos that a very kind woman had put together, a slideshow of photographs of Penecost programs at Grace Church, all programs that my good friend Kit designed. There she is, in her element, surrounded by people, butterflies and balloons. Carol Nuss put together the slideshow and they showed it at Grace Episcopal on Pentecost. Dean Sally told me that people watched it with tears in their eyes, but laughing, too. I was so relieved to see that the disk worked in my Mac, because she had put it together with a Windows program. And it worked, just fine. After we came down from Pike's Peak the other day, we drove to Carol's house, up by Garden of the Gods, to get that disk. (She's making a more edited one for Phil, with the music of James Galway playing "Wind Beneath My Wings." She showed it to me when I came to get the CD, and we held hands and watched it, both with tears. I never met her before but we were bound by our caring for Kit...)

I'm going to use the photos to make a notebook for each of the kids and Phil, and one for me, with the beautiful photos of Kit at church, and also the material from her application to become a deacon....an autobiography that she wrote and the answers from the committee which evaluated her application to become a deacon. It's lovely stuff, to keep and treasure. I never realized what a big deal it was, her being accepted to study to be a deacon.

I checked the other night; a plane ticket between Indy and Colorado Springs is only about $229 round-trip. Why didn't I go to see her more often? It makes me sick to think that I could have and didn't.

I hope that both my girls can join me to go out for the Rocky Mountain Women's Film Festival, the first weekend of November. I wrote to another old friend of Kit's and asked her if she could come as well, perhaps with her daughter.

We are now 220 miles from Indianapolis, so will arrive home late tonight. It's 7:10 Indiana time.

We are driving home a couple of days early because my mom was in the hospital this week, getting blood transfusions. I don't think they know what caused her anemia and to have some internal bleeding, evidently, but the situation seems to be better. She has had an EKG, a colonoscopy and an x-ray of her colon. So, she is back at home at Redbud Hills.

She knows that I will not be over to see her till tomorrow morning.

My emotions are so on the surface, after spending time at the Webster house. Phil and the kids were great, and we felt totally at home and had good times with each of them. But, I realized that I had to face Kit's death head-on, being there. It was somewhat easier at home, to pretend that she didn't die.

Phil and Jordie got along great, which made me feel good. We hiked and had meals togehter and hung out...Maddie and Abby and I went on a "ghost tour" at the haunted Stanley Hotel in Estes Park (the hotel inspired Stephen King to write "The Shining"). We all went on Timber Ridge Drive, beyond Estes Park, up to the fierce winds and glorious views much higher up. And I felt so good that I did a bunch of hiking....even though I was short of breath, I consciously breathed slowly and deeply and felt OK.

Time together in the car is even good. Just hanging out.

...and more Colorado adventures

An outlook on Timber Ridge Road, then the very highest point we went -- a little over 12,000 feet, then Jordie and Abby at the water clock at Royal Gorge, then Abby and Maddie at the haunted Stanley Hotel in Estes Peak!

Colorado adventures

Alpine flowers, up above the tree line, on the day we drove up from Estes Park on the Timber Ridge Road...then a baby white buffalo and a mom and baby buffalo at the Royal Gorge zoo, then Jordie and Abby at an outlook high on Timber Ridge Road...

(Featuring the beautiful and talented Amalia Shifriss!) Paul McCartney - Starbucks Global Listening Event EPK Part 1

OK, test of true friendship! Watch this video from youtube.com and you can see a couple of brief views of our beautiful golden girl Amalia, dancing around at the Starbucks where she works in Sherman Oaks, on the occasion of the release of Paul McCartney's new album. She's dancing around (on the right) at 2:14 into the video and she's standing around with her fellow employees (she's wearing braids, at left) at 3:34 into the video. You can move the little thing at the bottom of the screen to fast-forward to those spots!

Hillary Clinton Sopranos Spoof.

This is funny, even if, like me, one only heard about the Sopranos final episode! I like it that they did a spoof!

Pretty red rocks

Today I visited Nancy (Kit's mom) and Ferd in the morning. Abby came with me. We ended up staying for lunch. Nancy and I cried a few times.

This afternoon Em came over and took us to Garden of the Gods -- incredibly beautiful red rock formations. We walked, Jordie kept taking photographs, Em and I had some really good talks. In some ways, she reminds me so much of Kit -- the way she takes care of people, organizes things. She's really kind and beautiful. And her beautiful little nose stud actually looks really nice, which may influence my ban on Abby getting one...It is so unfair that Kit did not live to see their beautiful kids get married and have children and take their places in the world.

Anyway, we went walking around in Manitou Springs and looked at the cute little stores...Em made strawberry/rhubarb pie for dessert tonight and she had already made a big pasta dish ahead of time....then after dinner, the guys made a fire and we sat around...now we're watcing The Big Lebowski with Miles...

At the Webster house...

This is Abby with Annie, the darling Irish terrier.

We arrived at the Webster house yesterday, after a fine day of driving. Amazing how easy a cross-country drive can be when the youngest person in the car is 15! (I remember driving home from Colorado many years ago with a six-year-old and a two-year-old in the car, and memories of that trip are not so tranquil!) We really had a good time traveling together, though, and as we got close to Colorado, Jordie had to hop out of the car to take photos of antelope!

Dinner last night with Phil, Emily, Maddie, Miles and Maddie's boyfriend, Brad. Then, after dinner Phil and Jordie and I hiked in Palmer Park, a wild and beautiful place! High above the twinkling lights of the city, we walked along horse tracks, saw mountain bikers and Ponderosa pines and lots of wild yucca.

Oh, and Maddie made beautiful gourmet strawberry cupcakes for dessert last night -- with homemade icing and strawberries on top. Maybe I can have one for breakfast!

Just a moment to write...

...because we're getting ready to leave and drive to Colorado in the early morning...this morning I ran over to my office to fax an insurance paper to Sandy and leave a note for Carol about the time cards; ran over to drop a load of stuff I'd been collecting for Salvation Army; then, as I started to drive east to pick up my mom and go to Brown County to pick up Abby and Whitney from Camp Palowopec, I was behind a pickup on Grimes Lane which ran a stop sign and hit a car at Grimes and Washington so I jumped out with the ever-handy reporters notebook I keep in my purse and gave the older couple who'd gotten hit my name and cell phone number and told them I had seen it clearly and that the pickup guy had clearly run the stop sign (inside my car, I was saying to myself "Oh, my God — he's not going to stop for that sign!" and he didn't, even though he was telling the older couple "Oh, yes, I sure did stop at that sign and I had the right of way" and I looked him in the eye and said "You sure didn't and I saw everything!")and the policeman called me on my cell and I gave my report over the phone while driving to Brown County and then the girls were still asleep when Mom and I got there and we had to wait an hour and then it was too late to follow our tradition and eat breakfast at the Hob Nob in Nashville after camp pick up because Jordie had to have the van back because he saw something he didn't like in the engine (which turned out to be OK) and they would look at it if he got the van over there by 11:30 so we drove back to our house, changed cars and then went to the Village Deli and stuffed ourselves! and I still have to:

• put labels on a bulk mailing of 400 postcards
• address about 30 personalized letters I did to invite people to be on the Membership Committee at Beth Shalom this year
• pack my suitcase
• put together enough reading material for two weeks
• put away a mountain of laundry
• clean sheets on the bed
• get a box ready to mail to Zohar
• call Sandy about a fax and whether it went through
• run to the grocery to get chicken and ice cream for Adam to have while we are gone
• run over to visit with Mom before we go
• run one more load of laundry...

AND...

• give up on making the house any more organized before we go!
• give up on vacuuming out the car!

BUT FIRST I'M GOING TO ... take a nap!

Snapshot of today

Jordie, Judy, Amalia, Adam, Abby, Lynne. In front, Matthew and Megan, Amalia's college friend, now teaching in Chicago.














Moshe Avraham, the jeweler. He looks like a person I would like to have known.

















I've realized that I haven't blogged in quite awhile, so am pasting a copy of a letter I wrote to our cousin Zohar today...

Adam is coming over in a while, to help me understand how to use our grill. We have some tuna steaks and some chicken. He’s at a meeting at the library right now; he took three classes in summer school so that he can graduate on time next year. He will be gone the fall semester, doing an internship with the General Accounting Office in Washington, D.C. It’s through the School of Public and Environmental Affairs, where he is majoring in Public Policy. Adam lives in a house near campus, with two other boys, and we don’t see him often enough!

I hear Jordie’s car outside the window. He’s sitting, listening to something on NPR before he comes in.

I went over to Red Bud Hills this afternoon; that’s a retirement residence where my mom lives now, just a mile away from our house. Lou and Lenny Newman were playing piano and accordian, which they do every month. They retired to Bloomington a long time ago, and they are very involved with the School of Music. But the songs they played today were not classical – they were sweet old songs that my mom and I (and others) sang along to, like “Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do – I’m half crazy, all for the love of you…” and selections from Fiddler on the Roof and Mary Poppins and ragtime and polka music and finally, the IU fight song! I know them from Beth Shalom, and I think I’m going to make a contribution in their honor, so it’ll say in the bulletin “To Lenny and Lou, for the beautiful music they make!”

I had a column in the paper on Saturday; I write occasional columns for the religion page. I will paste it below.

*******************************
Thinking about Religion

By our silence, do we betray our faith?

By Lynne Foster Shifriss

June 9, 2007

I hope that the way I behave in my daily life is in tune with my religious beliefs.

I hope that.

Sometimes, though, I wonder just how far I am from that ideal.

I recently let a comment go by when I should have said something.

Someone asked me if I could believe that anyone would say that Jesus loves gays.

I stood, frozen. I pretended I hadn’t heard. I said something inane and steered the talk in another direction.

In my silence, I felt terrible.

Because, in my religion, being gay is just fine.

I am a liberal Jew, a member of a Reform congregation.

From the Reform Judaism Web site:
We believe that all human beings are created in the image of God, and that we are God’s partners in improving the world. Tikkun olam — repairing the world — is a hallmark of Reform Judaism as we strive to bring peace, freedom, and justice to all people.

And more:
Reform Jews are also committed to the full participation of gays and lesbians in synagogue life as well as society at large.

I believe that. So how could I be silent?

Just as important, I have three really good friends who are in long-term same-sex relationships. Each of those relationships would be envied by many heterosexuals — I’ve never seen more loving and kind partnerships.

By my silence, did I betray friendship?

Uncomfortably, I thought later of what I wished I could have said: “Oh, I thought Jesus loved everybody, but then I guess I wouldn’t know, because I’m Jewish.”

Later that weekend, in the New York Times, I read how a young man had started to wear his kippah (a skullcap, worn by many Jews as a sign of respect for God) all the time: He explained that he started wearing a skullcap while teaching a class on prejudice. His students had pointed out that Jews can usually hide their minority status, but African-Americans cannot. “Jews can pass,” he said, “so I took away the option of passing.”

I thought — that’s what I had done. I had passed.

Because it was easier, I had let that person think that what was said was OK with me.

After I read about the young man wearing his kippah all the time, I thought that if I had only been wearing my kippah or a Star of David, perhaps that person who dared to speak for Jesus would not have assumed that we shared common beliefs.

Lynne Foster Shifriss is assistant to the editor at The Herald-Times.
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Did Jordie tell you that I discovered, on the Internet a second cousin of his? Her name is Judy, and she lives in Chicago with her husband Shlomo. She is a nurse and he is an allergist. They met in the med school at Hebrew University. They have three daughters, all married with children. Her father was Shoshana’s first cousin. Her grandfather was the jeweler who made exquisite pieces, some for royalty. I will paste a picture we took in Chicago last summer of our family with Judy and her grandson, Matthew. You can see how tall Adam is now! Also I will paste a picture of Judy’s grandfather, the jeweler. The inscription says “Work is the joy of life.”

We are driving to Colorado next week to stay with friends. One of my dearest friends from college died suddenly in January (of a heart attack) and we will stay at their house and take some day trips into the beautiful mountains…Phil, her husband, was my boyfriend for a year in college. We broke up, and later they got together. (OK, I had to have some counseling about that! But I treasured her friendship, so I got over it and we’ve all seen each other many times over the years.) They have a 21-year-old daughter and 16-year-old twins. One twin, Maddie, plays the harp and I’ve been trying to get her to come back with us – there is a Harp Festival at the School of Music in July.

After we get back from Colorado, I’m going to hop on a plane and visit Amalia in Los Angeles for a few days…I want to walk on the beach and fix dinner together and just hang out with our girl…

Abby has been saying to Jordie that he needs to take her to Israel, that she was too young to remember all the relatives from our last trip… Abby is at camp in Brown County this week, and the house is quiet. I think I will go and have a cup of tea and ask my sweet husband how his day went…and I will paste those pictures in.