Past Blogs

Last week, I was driving west across the 311 miles of Pennsylvania on I-80, our second longest cross continental road, which goes from the doorstep of New York City to San Francisco. A ways in, I spotted a large sign which said: Highest Point East of the Mississippi on I-80, Elevation 2,250 Feet.

This spurred my brain to wonder where the tallest of the tall peaks were located on my side of that mighty river. My first guess was Mount Washington in New Hampshire.  I asked my husband who was riding in the shotgun seat to get out his cell phone and do a little research. Road trips are great opportunities for educational experiences.

My guess was not in the top ten. The ten highest peaks are all in the southern Appalachians either in North Carolina or Tennessee. Mount Mitchell outside of Asheville, North Carolina, is the highest at 6,684 feet. But height-wise, my guess wasn’t too far off. Mount Washington is 6,288 feet. And it certainly gets top prize for horrendous weather conditions of deep snow and 100 mile per hour winds.

Pennsylvania might not have the tallest mountains but they do have other claims to fame. They have a cracked bell. And there is that city entirely devoted to the production of chocolate and another that is the home of Peeps. Plus, shortly after the “Highest Point” sign was an I-80 exit for Punxsutawney, home of Phil, the world’s most famous groundhog. Height is not everything.

P.S. In case you find yourself driving west of the Mississippi River on I-80, the highest point on that side of the river is Sherman Summit in Wyoming at 8,640 feet.

I came across an elegant description of airports in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s book The Vine of Desire. The setting was LAX, but the words resonate universally.

There’s a certain magic in airports. Loci of arrivals and departures, they make the air crackle and surge. Worries circle overhead in airports like disoriented birds — possibilities also. In airports, the horizon is always golden–but eminently reachable. In a minute you might be pulled up into it, released of gravity. One can take on a new body here, shrug off old identities.

Airports, like their predecessors, the grand, old train stations, are gateways to new adventures. While most modern American airports lack the opulence of past depots, some do have monumental spaces. Denver’s main terminal mimics the front range of the Rocky Mountains behind it. The peak like roofs are an engineering marvel of stretched canvas.

Denver’s airport was a subject of national ridicule when it was being built. Critics scoffed that the location was remote, the roof wouldn’t last and the baggage system was a disaster. The naysayers were proven wrong on all points.

With family on both coasts, I fly frequently. Bad weather does happen, and some airport delays are inevitable. So I have mused on the best airport in which to be stranded. My vote goes to Minneapolis. It has a real bookstore and some affordable food. On the plus side for people who don’t like to sit and wait, it has miles of hiking trails, a.k.a. gates. One concourse is shaped exactly like a gigantic electric plug.

My least favorite airport in America is Reagan in Washington D.C. The smell of stale grease from fast food concessions plus crumbling walls and floors are not conducive to happy traveling.

Albuquerque’s International Sunport is my favorite American airport. It’s perched on a ridge looking over the Rio Grande valley. The main hall  is a beautifully crafted tribute to Pueblo architecture and is filled with Native American art. No other airport in America that I know of exudes such a sense of place……except Key West.

The Key West Airport will not be winning any awards for its architecture. But when your plane touches down, you are immediately greeted by a large sign which proclaims, “Welcome to the Conch Republic”. Right now, I could use another country, one in which I am already a citizen.

I could say that my beach glass addiction is altruistic and that I am ridding our beaches of litter; smashed beer and wine bottles and various other glass items that are tossed into Lake Michigan.

That statement, however, would be untrue. I am simply in love with treasure hunts. Beach glass is not the only thing I search for. No week is complete without a trip to a thrift store. Searching for well designed, carefully made items amidst loads of not so great stuff is a pleasure for me. It is a joy not shared by my husband who, if we are together, indulges in the pleasure of a cat nap in the car while I enjoy the hunt.

However, we both concur on one of life’s most rewarding treasure hunts, travel. We define travel as moving out beyond our own backyard. Exploring all the parks, woods, shores and trails near our own home provides endless sources of discovery. The natural world is full of surprises waiting to be observed.

We are equally enthusiastic to explore man made environments, the world’s great cities and towns. Strolling in downtowns, uptowns and historic districts is rife with serendipitous discoveries.

Fortunately, we have a wonderful resource for discovering the hidden treasures in many cities both here and abroad. One of our family members is an ardent traveler and chronicler of the built environment.  Exploring by foot or bike, he is a true urban enthusiast. Here is a link to one of his travel blogs. Pour a glass of wine…..Tim does not write one minute blogs as I do.

One of the oddest and most unforgettable conversations I ever had took place at my uncle’s assisted living apartment many years ago. A male acquaintance of my uncle stopped by, and my relative introduced me saying, “This is my niece Mary from Wisconsin.”

The elderly gentleman looked directly at me and said, “Are you blood or law?”

It took me a few seconds to grasp his meaning. However, I did recover quickly enough to reply that in my family it didn’t make any difference, but, for the record, I was “blood”. The fact that I had come 1,200 miles to help out my ailing relative would apparently have been diminished if I had been a “law”. I couldn’t have been more surprised if he had asked me, “Are you gay or straight?”

I am extremely happy that my husband and my families don’t view the world and our relatives as a large caste and clan system based on blood lines and categories. In fact, we even claim relatives who aren’t technically ours because we enjoy seeing them so much.

I suspect other families do this as well. Here is one of the many ways these relationships can happen.

When your aunt or uncle gets married, you call the spouse uncle or aunt as well. However, the sisters and brothers of your “married-into” aunts and uncles aren’t related to you. And their children aren’t your cousins. No matter to us, we call our non-cousins, cousins anyway. They are wonderful friends plus we share a common relative.

We are lucky to have many of these unidentifiable relationships: our niece’s mom and dad, another niece’s sister or my cousin’s aunt who’s not my aunt.

The English language should have a word for these special people. Blood lines be damned…..we are all family.

The car is gone. I am referring to the car on the ice on Lake Michigan at our Manitowoc Marina. It now resides on the bottom of the lake…..presumably forever.

Years ago, I would listen to Prairie Home Companion’s Lake Wobegon stories. The fictional residents of that fictional town would haul a junker car out onto their iced over lake and place bets on when it would sink. Little did I know that this was not merely a storyteller’s great yarn, but rather a grand tradition in the upper Midwest, a.k.a., the tundra.

At the end of January, I read the following headline in my local paper, “Rotary Club Puts Car On Ice For Fundraiser”. Residents were encouraged to buy tickets and guess the month, day, hour and minute the car would sink. First prize was $1000, and second prizes were cruises to the Bahamas, where, presumably, there is no ice.

Rest assured that this bizarre fundraiser is not an environmental nightmare. The students at our local technical college stripped off and drained out any possible pollutants from the car. What is left is best described as a car carcass.

The 1989 Ford minivan went under on 5:19 a.m. on February 28. The Rotary got more money for their charities, the lucky winners got their prizes and we all got increased hope that spring might arrive.

I must also report that Minnesota has us outclassed in their car sinking events. Then again, Minnesota has us Badgers outclassed in almost everything they do these days, except their nickname. I couldn’t handle being a Golden Gopher.

The Cass Lake, Minnesota, Lions Club has put a red Ford Escort out onto the lake for the last ten years….the SAME Ford Escort. They attach a hook and cable to the car’s frame and drag it back up on shore when all the ice melts in late spring. True recyclers.