Connecting Cross Country

From Wrigleyville with Joe, I headed back to the near west side to spend time with Kindra and family.  One of the things I love about visiting Chicago is that I only drive when I arrive into the city and when I leave.  Otherwise, I take public transportation everywhere.  So I hopped on the “L” for a little afternoon ride.

Kindra, my best friend from college, was the first person to know everything about me and love me anyway.  She’s been there for me in a crisis more times than I can count.  Most recently, she came to my rescue at the Brat Stop in Kenosha, Wisconsin after my car died, complete with 7-week-old son, Elias, in tow.  I stayed with Kindra and Chris and their 3 kids during my stay in Chicago.  They live in a gentrifying neighborhood, East Garfield Park, close to the Garfield Park Conservatory.  They moved into this neighborhood and bought a house because of their involvement with an organization called Breakthrough, which provides numerous sports opportunities, as well as a preschool, for the neighborhood youth.  That afternoon, Kindra and Chris were volunteering at a basketball tournament, so I went along to get a glimpse of the work of Breakthrough and to help watch the older kids, Ben and Caroline.

The playground and basketball court were packed with kids of all ages.  I was expecting something casual and amateur, but this was quite the real deal!  The teams had coaches yelling from the sidelines; the referees were officially garbed in black and white stripes.  I tried to occupy the kids, but 3 1/2-year-old Caroline hadn’t really taken a nap, so between heat and fatigue, there wasn’t much I could do to quell her cries for mommy.  So then Kindra took the kids and I helped at the registration table, which was a lot of fun, talking to some of the kids from the neighborhood.  It was amazing to see how many people from the neighborhood knew Ben and Caroline–it really felt neighborhoody.

The last time I saw Kindra, Caroline was also crying for her mommy, but it was because she was barely a month old.  It was fun to see her turning into a delightful little girl.  And 5-year-old Ben is also so smart and fun.  He was very interested in all the states I’ve been to and he has an unreal love of numbers.  And baby Elias rounds out the trio–literally–he’s quite round!

Elias

Ben and Elias

Caroline and Elias

When Kindra moved to Chicago a dozen years ago, I would visit a couple times a year.  This continued through her meeting and marrying the ever-steady and patient Chris.  She and I saw U2 together on the Vertigo Tour back in 2005 right before I moved to Los Angeles.  Since it’s now a 4 hour flight rather than a 4 hour drive between our homes, we haven’t seen each other for about 3 1/2 years now.  But I never doubt the strength of our love and friendship.  I think we’re in each other’s lives forever, whether we like it or not, but thankfully, we like it.  When I think about what I have with Kindra, cement comes to mind.  Strong.  Steady.  Stable.

No visit is complete without playing a few games together, which Chris usually wins, or without a couple of discussions with deep and probing questions.  What a haven at this point in the trip to have such a home away from home.

Kindra and the kids

Ben tried to take a picture of Chris and Kindra and me, but it didn’t quite turn out.

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I met up for lunch in Chicago with high school marching band mates Adam and Joe.  They hadn’t seen each other in awhile either, so they were excited to reunite, as well.  Adam became drum major after I was drum major (so if you’re following the line through Facebook friends I’ve thus visited, it went from Leslie to Janise and me to Adam), and Joe was in the trumpet section.  Joe’s family moved to Chicago for his senior year of high school, and he has never left.  The three of us met for lunch, then Joe and I went to tour the small campus where he teaches.

Both Adam and Joe were in Chicago for college, at Northwestern and DePaul respectively.  And both stuck around.  And both still cheer for St. Louis sports teams (atta boys!).  Adam got his MBA from the Kellogg School at Northwestern and works in the upper echelons of administration at Northwestern University Hospital in downtown Chicago.  He is obviously very capable and talented in his field.  And he also genuinely cares about people.  You can tell by the way he asks questions and by the details he remembers about people’s lives.  He was very intentional about getting together on my visit to Chicago with the short amount of time he had on his lunch hour.  He was also deliberate about making plans with Joe for the future.  And he means it.  It’s unfortunate how rare that is and how much it stood out.

I often remember Adam’s much younger sister Cathryn who would come along to band competitions and football games.  She was about 7 when I was a senior, and Adam posted something on Facebook about her having an internship for college this summer.  To exercise the denial I felt at feeling so old, I posted what I remembered about her singing this song with all the president’s names in order in a little tiny voice when she was so young.  Then Adam’s mom commented about remembering that song, too.  It was a funny Facebook moment.  And I still felt old when it was all over.

When lunch was over, Joe and I walked Adam back to work before heading north to Wrigleyville.  It was clear even in our goodbyes, that Adam enthusiastically welcomes any kind of visit with such a friendliness.  It was such an encouragement.

Adam and Joe

Joe and I hopped on the “L” and sneered in the direction of Wrigley Field when we got off the train.  Joe studied music in college.  Now he teaches music at the Salvation Army Officer Training School in Chicago.

Most people are familiar with the Salvation Army.  What most people might not know (and I didn’t until I met Joe and his sister Jenny and their family), is that the Salvation Army is basically a denomination like Baptist or Lutheran, and they have churches with pastors.  But since they’ve adopted the model of army offices, the pastors of the churches are called “officers.”  The school where Joe works is the seminary to train the people who will be pastors in the Salvation Army churches.  Joe teaches music–from how to lead and direct to how to choose music for different occasions.

The campus of the school is nestled on a square block right in the middle of the city, which is quite appropriate for the work that they do.  The Salvation Army excels across the board in truly investing in and transforming the lives of people in the urban environments that most people would steer clear of.  Joe is proud of the work that he does, and he has found quite a niche, but he also sees it through a realistic lens, which is a delicate balance, difficult to master, one that didn’t even register until I was reflecting on our visit.  He and his wife have refrained from going through officer training, which is a very rare choice for someone in their position.  But the officers in the Salvation Army are a lot like Catholic priests, in that the church can call them to or away from a location at any time.  By not being officers, Joe and his wife can maintain a certain level of stability and freedom, especially as they welcome their first child.

The highlights of the campus tour were both in a historic mansion that served as the original school building: the second oldest elevator in the city of Chicago and the vintage era uniforms used in productions of “Guys and Dolls.”

The second oldest working elevator in the city of Chicago, located in one of the buildings, a former residence, on the Salvation Army campus.

This uniform was one of many uniforms from different eras that are set aside and used for performances of "Guys and Dolls."

My visits with Adam and Joe got my time in Chi-town off to such a great start, especially after such a harrowing time the previous day with car trouble in Kenosha.

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Finally!  A reliable internet connection and some time to catch up on documenting the multitude of great visits I’ve had.  Thank you for bearing with me through this much longer than anticipated hiatus.  Today I bring you my visits in Wisconsin (Hello, Wisconsin!).  I called a dear friend Micky, who went to school in Eau Claire, for recommendations on where to eat and stopped at the Grand Avenue Cafe.  Had a great waiter who was wearing a shirt with a big pheasant on it.  He’s in a band, the name of which he wrote on a napkin for me, which I cannot currently locate.

From Eau Claire, I landed in Madison and visited Grace.  Grace had a baby less than 2 weeks before I arrived, so she definitely had a free pass to not get back to me, but sure enough, on my drive through Wisconsin, I heard from her and gave her a call.  Her husband Nathan picked up the phone and sported an excellent accent.  “Way to pick ’em, Grace!” I thought.  He’s from New Zealand and is a speech pathologist at the University of Wisconsin.  Grace is in the process of getting her Ph.D.  I met up with them and Anne (after Anne of Green Gables) and newborn Alistair in their backyard amidst a lot of major road construction.  Some sub-tours on this journey include Big Ten college towns and state capitols.

One of the many state capitols I've seen on the trip--this one in Madison, Wisconsin.

Grace and I met when I was a freshman and she was a sophomore at Michigan.  We were the only two undergraduate students who went to our small church at that time.  We really don’t think we’ve seen each other since that time, though we had several friends of friends.  I remember liking Grace, but not really knowing her very well.  Sitting down with Grace and Nathan and the kids, even for a short time, I thought they were super cool.  I feel like I’ve almost gotten to know Grace better via Facebook than I ever knew her in undergrad.  We had the stereotypical catch-up exchange when we became friends on Facebook–she’d heard about some of what I’d been up to in Los Angeles–and that led to jumping right into a great breadth of conversation in-person.  Grace often posts things that I appreciate, as well.  It was great to manifest in real life a connection that felt like it deepened online.

Anne, Nathan, Alistair, and Grace

Since my visit with Grace and family was planned so last-minute (and I miscalculated the distance from Twin Cities to Madison to Milwaukee), it was brief.  And soon I headed off in rush-hour traffic toward Milwaukee.  Who knew that Madison would actually have rush hour?

I landed in Milwaukee at my college friend Amy’s house.  Last I saw her was at a mutual friend’s wedding when she was pregnant with daughter Chloe.  Now she and husband Dave have Chloe and Ty.  Before that, I saw her at her own wedding.  Amy and our friend Emily and I would meet weekly at the end of undergrad to talk about life together.  It was one of the best times of close committed friendship and community I’ve had in my life, and I will always remember it with a deep fondness.

Amy is a quieter person, so I think she can be overlooked by people.  But once you get to know her, it is such a privilege to be one of the people she shares her inner thoughts with.  Being friends with her makes me feel like I’m in on a secret hidden treasure that other people miss out on.  She is a deep well of wisdom and insight.  She is a true and loyal friend.  And from the days of our being single college girls, it’s fun to see how her life has evolved to wife and mother of two and part-time landscape architect.  Even in our short time together, I caught glimpses of how she uses her wealth of creativity both professionally (even in their own front yard) and parentally.

Amy, Chloe, and Ty

Once Amy made me a collage of pictures for a birthday card.  She put it in the sleeve of her binder of recipes at that time, and it has stayed there to this day.  A fun walk down memory lane:

Amy's birthday card to me almost 9 years ago!

Amy and family were kind enough to host me in a brief space between other house guests.  I’m so grateful I got the chance to spend time with them!

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Hello, dear readers. I have been back in the groove of visits for nearly a week now, having resumed on Saturday, but due to the large number of visits in my hometown of St. Louis which leaves little time to blog and to little access to internet, I have fallen about 30 people behind!

I continue to have an amazing time! So many visits. So many stories. Since Twin Cities, I headed through Madison and Milwaukee to Chicago. From Chicago, I headed through Des Moines to Kansas City. From Kansas City, I was supposed to head into Kansas and Oklahoma, but I came home to St. Louis to rest instead. I have been here for over a week now! In addition to reconnecting with many old friends, I have visited many of my old haunts and hangouts, and I even got to the new Busch Stadium for the first time….to see U2 in concert!

I leave here tomorrow to visit my grandma and other family in western Illinois. The initial route has been adjusted due to the longer-than-anticipated stay in St. Louis to accommodate the number of friends I have here. Will keep you posted and get the stories going. Thanks for bearing with me! It means so much to have you along for the journey.

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I am taking a detour to go home and sleep for a couple days.  I did not quite master how to rest and see as many people as possible as quickly as possible and not burn out from the month-long adrenal overload.  So I will be off the grid in St. Louis for a couple days, then resuming visits in St. Louis, then resuming the trip.

I will re-emerge on Saturday.  Thanks for understanding!

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My gracious hosts in the Twin Cities were college friend Jenny, her husband Courtney, and their adorable 6-month-old daughter Alexi.  As with many visits along the trip, I caught the family in the midst of transition.  After having Alexi, Jenny returned to work, but after 3 months, decided to transition from work to staying home.  Only two weeks into being a full-time stay-at-home mom, it seems to be suiting them just fine.  Eat your hearts out ladies and gents:

6-month-old Alexi

The process of getting to kids can be so difficult for a lot of families–I have heard many stories of infertility and miscarriage on this trip.  And then to have to decide what to do once you have the kid can be just as hard.  A friend once said, “We are telling women they can have it all, but what they don’t say is that you can’t have it all at the same time,” and I think to a certain extent it’s true.  I have no idea what I would do in the same situation, and of course, a lot of different factors come into play.  I have seen many different family dynamics working splendidly while I’m on this journey: nannies, day cares, stay at home moms, etc.

Jenny spent a good chunk of her childhood in England, so she has a British accent, so to hear her baby talk with Alexi with her accent was just about the cutest thing in the world.  While Alexi took her morning nap, Jenny and I took the most intentional and deliberate walk down memory lane yet on the trip by looking through the incredible scrapbook she made of her college years.  What struck me that hadn’t before was that Jenny and I intersected in college a lot more than I remembered  We were in the same group of 5 or 6 freshmen women at an event for freshmen and continued to meet as a group throughout the rest of the year.  We were in another small group together during a week-long leadership training after our sophomore year.  Jenny’s college roommate was from St. Louis, so she had pictures of her visits to places where I grew up.  We swapped stories, tried to remember some of the names that went with the various faces in the pictures, shared some laughs and some touching moments.  She had various pictures of “The Jens” or of “The Jens and The Jeffs.”  There were, at different times, 3 or 4 Jens or Jennys and 3 Jeffs in our group of friends.  It was just as easy to be with Jenny in conversation as it was to be with Jenny when she was mothering.

Jenny also took me to a great sculpture park in downtown Minneapolis adjacent to the Walker Art Museum.  I have visited Minneapolis several times to visit my best friend from college, but I haven’t seen a lot of the city.  There was a sculpture that was nearly identical to a sculpture in front of the University of Michigan art museum.  It’s a giant wing made out of metal.

Nautilus (1976) by Charles Ginnever, at the Walker Sculpture Garden in Minneapolis.

Charles Ginnever's Daedulus (1975) in front of the University of Michigan Art Museum, from the museum's web site.

And this next one is a classic Walker Sculpture Garden image…the stem of the cherry is actually a fountain that spits out water (when it’s not freezing outside, of course).

Spoonbridge and Cherry, by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje Van Bruggen, 1985-1988

It was so delightfully relaxing to stroll around and chat in a serene environment in the middle of the city, park the stroller, get Alexi out and play, and look at art.  I regret not getting more time with Courtney, who seems to be such a good man and such a good fit for Jenny.  It has actually been a major encouragement to me to see my friends with such great spouses and to see my friends and their spouses as such great parents.  I met Courtney when he and Jenny and I attended the wedding of a mutual friend (one of the Jeffs, actually).  We only met briefly then, but to watch him interact with his daughter now was the greatest thing!  It is pretty incredible how two first-time parents can seem like old pros just a few months in.  Courtney was also really good at explaining the intricacies of his job to a layman like me.  Plus, he wore a Michigan shirt both days I was there, so that makes him a-MAIZE-ing in my book!

Jenny, Alexi, and Courtney

Mindy and I met at her place a literal four blocks from the sculpture garden that night, so I began and ended my Twin Cities day in full-circle fashion.  She was the 5th of 5 friends I saw in my busiest day yet on the trip, and though I was tired, catching up with Mindy re-energized me.  We walked to a rooftop restaurant, Joe’s Garage, with a great vista of the basilica and warded off the mosquitoes for as long as we could.

I remember when Mindy moved into town in junior high because she was a girl who played the trumpet.  As a girl who played the French horn myself, Mindy was instantly cool in my mind.  And Mindy didn’t just play the trumpet in junior high–she was first chair most of the time.  But she opted for sports rather than band in high school and we wound up in different groups, though we had a lot of mutual friends.  I remember we both took a summer school gym class before freshman year and she was giving me tips that her dad had given her about running sprints after you finish doing a mile run to cool down.

Mindy wound up at the University of Wisconsin (go Big Ten) in advertising and moved to the Twin Cities.  She describes her work life as a lot like the show Mad Men.  I’ve always wondered what it would be like in the board rooms of ad agencies or corporations when the creative team pitches a new commercial, especially the ones that leave you scratching your head with their oddities.  Mindy mostly focuses on pets and animals, so if you’ve seen a dog food commercial, chances are, Mindy has her hand in it somehow.

She is a natural schmoozer, too–even though we aren’t very close friends, I never had any concerns about our time together–she’s just so easy to be around.  She was always able to walk the line between sporty and feminine with confidence, though she might try to tell you a different story.  Glasses in junior high made everyone a little bit awkward.  Mindy is the type of person who is comfortable enough in her own skin that she makes you more comfortable in your own.  So at the end of a long day of visits, she was the perfect person to detox with as the sun went down.

Mindy and St. Mary's Basilica from the roof of Joe's Garage. The mosquitoes who also joined us were too small to show up in this photograph.

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I think Penny is one of the most enjoyable people on the planet.  And I’m so glad that the University of Michigan put our dorm rooms next door to each other freshman year.  UofM does freshman orientation throughout the summer, when students come and live in a dorm and register for classes.  If you aren’t able to come during the summer, you attend Fall Orientation right before classes start and move into your dorm room a week early.  This is when I met Bay Area friend Christi.  And Penny and I were about the two only people in our hallway that early.  I remember that we were shopping for books sometime that first week.  We were at Michigan Book  & Supply on the corner of State St. and North University.  She looked at me and said, “I feel like I could burst into tears at any moment.”
I looked back at her and said, “Me too.”
“I haven’t told anyone that yet.”
“Me either.”
I think she forever sealed a place in my heart at that moment.

Penny is a very talented pianist, and I continued to play the French horn the first two years of college.  She and I would often venture up to North Campus where the music school was to use the practice rooms.  We had a lot of the same classes, so we would study or work on papers together.  We danced with pre-med classes and the idea of becoming doctors.  I joined intramural soccer, having never played outside of gym class because Penny was trying to recruit people from the dorm for the team.  She had this beanie hat that she’d knit herself, which seemed remarkably difficult and impressive.  And one time, Penny was determined to use the word “exacerbate” in her next English paper, and she did!

I moved out of the dorms and Penny stayed in the dorms sophomore year, and we lost touch.  After various adventures, she wound up at the University of Washington in Seattle to get a PhD, so we reconnected when I was out there helping my friend Susan move.  She found a niche in political communication, and continued to play music around town.  After a round of interviews and offers, she’s stopping back home in the Twin Cities before embarking on her next adventure—becoming a professor in Amsterdam!

We enjoyed swapping stories and laughs over dinner.  Penny is so genuine and endearing and flat out funny.  It poured down rain while we were eating, and as I drove away from our time together, there was a rainbow.

This rainbow came out after it poured during dinner with Penny in St. Paul.

I think there needs to be an international Phase 2 of this journey!

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Be sure to check out the post I re-posted on Beth and James.  Didn’t realize I’d only posted a picture.  AND, the car was repaired for a minimal fee, since the battery was under warranty at Sears.  Thanks to my big brother who taught me way back when to always get a battery at Sears so I could occupy myself by walking around the mall while it was being worked on, and to Kelley and the other guys at Sears in Kenosha, Wisconsin for doing a great job for little money in no time at all!  Onward!

Back to posting: Mark and Andrea are my good friends from Los Angeles.  I was in grad school with Mark, and one day Andrea showed up to our internship, and I remember instantly liking her.  They got married during grad school, and then Andrea was my manager during my stint at Starbucks after grad school.  One of our former coworkers said she was the best manager he’d had in any job.  The last time I saw them was at their going away party in Los Angeles.  They moved to Chicago for a new job for Mark.  But they haven’t yet found permanent housing in Chicago and Mark has been getting trained and traveling and working a lot, so I saw Andrea in Blaine, Minnesota where she was visiting her family.  I was supposed to meet Mark north of Chicago on my way into town and his way out of town, but instead he came to my rescue in Kenosha, Wisconsin when my car died.

While we were in Los Angeles, Mark and Andrea were pretty significant friends of mine, people I could rely on during a struggle or crisis.  Mark helped me move. I picked up Andrea’s mom at the airport right after she’d given birth to their son Evan.  I’ve babysat Evan on various occasions and got to watch him grow.  So it was rather perfect, actually, when Andrea was having a tough day when we met over coffee, and I was stranded on the side of the road when I was supposed to meet with Mark.  It was the continuation of what our relationship had been in Los Angeles, only transferred to the context of this trip.  An intersection of us just living life and showing up in each other’s days.

I have always loved Andrea’s intuition and insight.  She has often helped me to hone in my overly-analytical tendencies.  When we sat down, she said to me, “You seem more at peace.”  And some of it is definitely this trip, and some of it is how at ease I am with her, what she brings out in me.  We navigate a path from deep conversation to belly laughter together.  She talked about what the transition out of LA had been like for them, and it really has been a great big 2-month long transition, some of the joys and struggles of spending time with family.  Mark echoed a lot of the same sentiments about enduring this transition period, along with the steep learning curve he has at his new job.  This was when we had finally gotten the car taken care of and got to sit down at The Brat Stop in Kenosha, which apparently is quite the local attraction.  One piece of thrilling news they shared is that they have gotten approved to adopt a child!

It wasn’t until I was saying goodbye to Mark in the parking lot at The Brat Stop that I realized this really was a significant goodbye, something I didn’t realize with Andrea, probably because I still had yet to see Mark.  I have pretty much been in denial that Mark and Andrea will now be halfway across the country.  It had gotten to the point in LA due to geography and work schedules, I was only seeing them every few months.  And that’s what it felt like, that I would see them again soon.  I’ve been meaning to write them both letters to tell them how much their friendship has meant to me, and I just haven’t been able to bring myself to do it. I haven’t been able to really say goodbye to them.

So Mark and Andrea (and Evan, and global baby to be), I’ll just say see you later.

In all the chaos of the car and getting picked up by my Chicago friend and her 2-month old at The Brat Stop, I neglected to get a picture with Mark. 😦

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My first memory of Luke is from second grade.  He had recently moved to town and to my class.  He was a threat to me in a lot of ways—I liked being the tallest and the smartest person in the class.  This new kid was smart, and he was tall, and I didn’t like that very much.  But then we had hat day at school.  And I vividly remember that the teacher turned off the lights to get us to be quiet (can you believe that actually used to work?), and Luke’s visor had different lights on in that lit up the room.  I thought someone with a hat that cool might be an OK person after all.

From when we were seven to when we were seventeen, Luke and I would go head to head in a lot of our classes.  It was a bit of a sibling rivalry.  But I have proof when he signed my senior yearbook that he conceded upon graduation that the odds were in my favor.  Luke was the kind of guy in high school who would do well in all the honors classes, played basketball, and was liked by everyone.  He sort of had a Keanu Reeves from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure persona back then.  But then he would spend his summers and spring breaks doing work trips and mission trips to Russia and Haiti.  And you could tell he was moved and challenged and changed by his experiences beyond the “Duuuuuuuude” mentality. [If you went to Parkway West and you have a yearbook from either 96 or 97, there’s a picture of Luke in Haiti putting a big pipe in the ground in the first few pages—I always thought it looked like it came out of National Geographic or something—such a great shot].

Luke and I lost touch after high school, but then I saw him at our 10-year reunion and I met his wife Jessa (then pregnant with their 2^nd daughter Nyah).  At the time, I was considering going overseas to combat human trafficking in Southeast Asia.  Without any hesitation, Luke offered his support and assistance in whatever way I would need.  I think our sibling rivalry became a sibling loyalty.  And my welcome in their home was no different.  In addition to daughters Elena and Nyah (ages 6 and 3), the family welcomed little Liza just 3 weeks ago.  And they had me over for lunch in the midst of all that!

Baby Liza Pearl, born on June 16th.

When I was being introduced to the family, upon arriving, I was also introduced to Shatera, a young woman who very much seemed to be a part of the family.  I wondered whether she might be the nanny, or whether she actually was a part of the family.  Partway through lunch, I broached the question of how Shatera fit in.  They all laughed.  “Yeah, we wondered how to tell you.  Shatera’s 17, which would mean Luke would have become a dad in high school.”  I was there and I know THAT didn’t happen.

It turns out that Shatera IS a part of the family.  She has had a pretty rough home life.  And now she lives with Luke and Jessa and the kids, only on the weekends during the school year, but more frequently during the summers.  Shatera is a truly lovely young woman.  Intelligent and well-spoken.  She is so obviously a survivor, with such a good head on her shoulders.  She was waiting to get her ACT scores back—territory I know all too well.  It is so apparent that she has a bright and shiny future ahead of her, and even more apparent that it will be brighter because of the love she is able to give and receive in the context of this family.  So cool.

Watching Luke and Jessa juggle family and food prep and discipline and crabbiness from little sleep from late-night fireworks was like watching a seamless dance.  I guess by kid number 3, there’s a certain rhythm that develops, but to see this little boy I knew hold a newborn like a football while calming a three year old and asking thoughtful questions about my life—I was stunned.  And Jessa, too.  Nothing can rattle her.  It was just so clear that they were firmly content in their life and that they had the perspective to know that a rough moment or a rough day would pass in time.

Luke is still competitive and competent.  He works for Oracle, which I guess is known for its cut-throat, what-have-you-done-for-me-lately atmosphere, but he is thriving in that environment.  And he coaches basketball in one of Minneapolis’s rougher urban neighborhoods.  Jessa is creative and funky, having recently stepped out of some more intensive roles, but still finding ways to contribute her various talents.

Looking at Luke’s life now: A successful career.  An amazing family.  Changing the lives of the people around him.  And doing it all with an easy-going confidence and generosity.  The odds might be in his favor now.  Or at the very least, he’s giving me a good run for my money.

Shatera, Nyah, Luke, Elena, Liza, and Jessa

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I didn’t even notice until 2 days later that I only posted the picture on this post.  Eesh.  I need to rest.  I arrived into Minneapolis after driving through the very American corn and bean fields of the northern Midwest on the 4^th of July.  Beth and James had been camping over the weekend, and wondered whether they might be too tired to get together, but due to my packed Twin Cities schedule, they generously agreed to push through their fatigue and hang out.  It’s a good thing it was a short drive from Orange City, Iowa to Twin Cities and I didn’t have to use the bathroom because ALL of the rest stops were closed.  And all of the state parks and campgrounds were, too, which significantly altered Beth and James’ holiday weekend camping plans.  Apparently the state government had reached a stalemate on approving the budget, so they closed rest areas and state parks.  If I didn’t accomplish a significant job task for 6 months, I think I’d be fired, but what do I know?

Beth and I were bunk mates at the summer camp for college kids where I worked in 2002 (see Danielle).  Her family and my family are from the same small town in Western Illinois—who knows, we might be distant cousins.  During that summer, James came to camp to work for 2 weeks, which is when he and Beth met.  He proceeded to write her letters over the next year.  They eventually got married and actually lived and worked at the camp before moving to Minneapolis.

The girls at camp and I worked through a lot of inner personal struggles that summer.  I remember Beth being a consistently bright spot of levity, helping me to take my deep processing tendencies less seriously.  She is burned in my memory from that summer with grubby camp clothes on, hair pulled back and messy, a smile from ear to ear, and a loud, boisterous laugh.

It was great to see how well Beth and James complement each other, too, especially since I only saw them when the beginning inklings of a relationship were percolating.  They are both passionate, but Beth’s bleeding-heart compassion is tempered by James’ logic.  Her idealism countered by his northern Michigan practicality.  They barely knew each other when I last saw them, and now they know each other’s strengths and habits so well.  They’re one of those couples where it makes total sense for them to be together.

What characterized my conversations with Beth and James during our visit was justice.  Beth worked at the history museum and learned a lot of the local history, especially concerning Native Americans.  They also visited New Orleans and knew the stories that led to the formation of the 9^th ward, which experienced the most significant damage after Hurricane Katrina.  Apparently a historical battlefield sits adjacent to the 9^th ward.  I can’t remember all of the details, but many people used to live on the site of the battlefield, and when the government wanted to turn that land into a historical site, those people were kicked off their land for a meager sum and moved into the 9^th ward.   I loved that our conversation meandered in that direction.  And I loved the Indian food we had for dinner.

Our goodbye was a little hard.  I really like Beth and James, and we have a lot in common.  We would be great friends if we lived in the same place.  I haven’t seen them in awhile.  And I probably won’t see them again for awhile.  And that fact was clear to both of us as we said goodbye.  I didn’t anticipate how difficult that aspect of this trip would be.  Reconnecting with people that I was once good friends with, who I would still be good friends with if our life circumstances brought us into closer proximity.  I really like the people I’ve known in my life.  And I wish there were a way to transport them all to the same place.  Perhaps that is some of the illusion that social networking affords, that you can maintain relationships with 200 or 600 or 900 people.  And to some extent you can.  But there is a large discrepancy between what I wish I could maintain and what I actually do maintain, which usually leaves me sad.  Maybe I can become employed as a professional friend.

Beth and James and me at the Indian restaurant where we had a delightful dinner. They model the menu here after Ghandi's diet.

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