End of Summer Interlude

Larry and I spent a long weekend in Lancaster County Pennsylvania recently. The purpose of the trip was to see Leon Redbone in concert at the Mt. Gretna Playhouse.

We left on Friday morning. A nice plan for a leisurely drive, stopping for a picnic of cold shrimp, cheese, bread, tomatoes; arriving in time to freshen up for dinner and then the theater.

A great plan; all went without incident until the approach to the George Washington Bridge at about 1 o'clock. And we sat. Bumper to bumper. Stop and go and mostly stop. A horrific drive.

You know we are country people. We lived for years in the small village of New Salem in western Massachusetts with its few hundred souls, a general store, library, town hall, post office and book store. Even our move to New Hampshire and a small town of 5,000 didn't alter our life style all that much.

We are not urban people. We are not accustomed to traffic tie-ups that go on endlessly for hours. But on that Friday, we sat in traffic for hours and hours and hours from the approach to bridge and into New Jersey. You know that old saw about spending a week in New Jersey one day. Well that is exactly what we did on that Friday -- at least that's what it felt like. We were on the New Jersey turnpike until nearly 6 PM. Unbelievable. Where oh where was that leisurely drive; where was that fine picnic -- it sat in the cooler getting warm as there was no time, no place, no way to get off the road and enjoy it.

In truth, we didn't get to our hotel in Lititz until after 7 PM; the show was scheduled to start at 8; we hadn't eaten; there was no time to freshen up; and we had a 20 minute drive to Mt. Gretna.

However the drive to the Playhouse was through the Amish countryside. Small tidy villages gave us our first sense of beauty. Of relaxation. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Mt. Gretna is a wonderful late 19th/early 20th century resort, a former Chattaqua site with small cottages, a lake, a playhouse. The air is clean. The grounds are immaculate. Very family oriented. We loved it on sight. This was our first time seeing Leon Redbone in concert; it was his 5th season at Mt. Gretna. He didn't disappoint us: his voice is wonderful; his guitar playing is better, more skillful than I'd imagined! After the concert, we found a chinese restaurant and ordered take out for the hotel room -- at 11 PM!

On Saturday, we played in the sweet town of Lititz, visited a farmer's market and Amish shops. Had our first taste of 'burlap roasted corn on the cob' and that was a great delight. I bought 'meadow tea' - a soothing and tasty iced mint tea - from an earnest Amish family and it seemed to wash away the aches and frustrations of the previous day.

The remainder of our weekend was lovely. We stayed in the Mt. Gretna Inn on Saturday and Sunday on the third floor in a sumptuous room. The Inn serves a candle light breakfast; one of the inn-keepers is a professional chef from Johnson & Wales in Rhode Island. His signature dish is stuffed French Toast: two pieces of toast with the lightest whipped cream cheese and blueberries inside and over top a delicious maple syrup. Oh my oh my oh my ........

We met several very interesting guests at the Inn. One couple was from Mississippi, who like us had come all that way for the Redbone concert! Another couple, celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary, had just returned to the States from Africa where they were missionaries. A fascinating story!

The Inn is an arts & crafts style home built by an entrepreneur. It sits back on a broad green lawn and is fronted by a wide porch with comfortable wicker furniture. And that is where we spent Sunday after breakfast. Reading. Snoozing. Reading ........ and in the late afternoon, we headed for the lake and fresh cool mountain water. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

By Sunday evening I was beginning to dread the trip home: I told Larry that I was not going home if I had to go through New Jersey. So he bought an atlas and planned a return trip that headed us in a northeasterly direction towards Allentown and then up the Delaware Water Gap. Lots of green. Lots of country roads and small towns. Lots of things to look at. Places to stop and visit along the way. That route took us to Port Jervis and then onto Route 84 through Connecticut, the Massachusetts Turnpike; up Routes 495 and 95 and home to York.

Along the return journey we stopped Dingman Falls, part of the Delaware Water Gap. It was a short, easy hike into the falls and just right for stretching legs for the next leg of the trip.

These images were taken on that little hike. .. .. .. .Now this is the way I like to travel!

It is the only way - at least for a country girl!

He Needed Me . . .

It was 1977. I was 33 years too young. And living in a small, wood-fired cottage in the foothills above the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts.

It was a funny sort of house, you know. Built into the side of a hill with the living room, kitchen and den on the upper floor and the bedrooms, bath rooms and laundry on the ground floor. Sliding glass doors opened onto a deck and woods. We had enjoyed all the seasons there: days spent cross-country skiing from that deck right into the woods. Packing gorp. Oranges. Apples. Enough for a day of skiing and home to a slow-cooker that eased a comforting aroma throughout the house. Our skiis were the 'old fashioned' kind that needed waxing. A small frustration to most skiers but I loved the job of figuring out the exact wax for the right temp and snow/ice conditions.

But that funny house was for sale in August of that year.

Dick my heart. My husband. The love of my life had gone to Ohio to begin a new job for a new corporation called, Guardian Unlimited, that was to be a moving force in 'cleaning' up an emptying the state institution in Columbus. Amy, my first child. My beautiful daughter just 12 years old had flown to Ohio to be with her dad when the new school year started. We had always lived in small villages and towns; in Ohio Amy would be in a large urban school and we were concerned. Starting school on the first day seemed to be the best plan so I bought an airline ticket from Hartford CT to Columbus Ohio for her. She and Dick would be staying with friends, also recent transplants from Massachusetts to Ohio until we sold our house in Massachusetts and our new house in Columbus was ready.

Really, this had been a very strange summer. Not at all typical. In June, Amy, 12 and Shelly, 15 flew by TWA from Boston to Los Angeles to spend two weeks with a favorite great aunt 'Nita. Amy was barely home when Dick left for the long drive to Columbus and the start of a new career. The morning he left, his car packed for the long trip, I stood at the door to say, 'goodbye'. I was overwhelmed by the thought that I would never see him again. More than a 'thought', it was an all-encompassing feeling, a sudden knowledge of 'alone-ness'.

I was only 19 when we married. A mere child. A slip of a girl. He was 26. And he was my life. My savior. My best friend. My only love and only lover. He loved me best. Always and ever. I thought I'd never see him again. Never feel his arms around me. . . or his lips on mine. Again. Ever.

In fact, I did make one trip to Columbus to look at real estate. We spent the weekend looking at homes in areas that frightened me, that I had no interest in living in. But I was a good scout and a faithful wife and I looked and looked and together we found a house and made a deposit and an offer.

Dialing forward to August 30 1977. I made a call to Dick late in the afternoon to report that our house had sold. An offer had been made and accepted; I had signed the papers and they were on their way to Ohio for his signature. I gleefully reported that I would soon join him and Amy. But he was too busy to talk; he said how pleased he was but that he was playing basketball with friends from work and needed to run .. .. .. to meet them for the game .. .. .. .. .. I finished up a few odd bits of work and left the office for home. It was a short drive really and I was soon there . . . in time to freshen up for dinner.

Dick's secretary had just died a sudden, sad death from cancer. She had a lover, an Episcopal minister who I had done some work with .. .. .. I knew Jack was hurting and had invited him for dinner that evening of August 30. Jack arrived on time. But I couldn't leave the house saying that I felt a strange feeling....a pain.....something......could we just sit awhile before leaving? Of course, Jack agreed.

I don't believe I was very good company that little while before the phone rang and the news that "Dick has had a heart attack". . . . "taken to a hospital". . . "stay where you are" . . . . "I will call as soon as I have more information".

There has never been one moment when I doubted that my body knew his distress. His pain. That a strong, invisible connection held us together in a mysterious, no spiritual way. That was what held me there in the house that evening.

Moments before the call came, I 'knew' he needed me. . . . but I could not help. Within a few minutes -- 30 or so? -- another call came from the hospital saying that Dick had died.

More Ordinary But So Joyful Days

Scenes of summer's bounty.

Yesterday, we visited the York Farmer's Market, a first for us.

When we lived in Rye, our regular Saturday destination was the big market in Portsmouth with its live music; ethnic food vendors; organic meats and produce; and flowers flowers flowers.

We approached the market not expecting to be WOWed but were delighted with the experience.

The market, only about a mile from our house, sits on the top of a little shady hill on Route 1 just off the Maine Turnpike and right next door to Stonewall Kitchen's flagship store (but that's another story for another blog post).

There were the usual craft vendors, non-profits and issue advocates:
but these were surrounded by small growers and bakers. Our bounty consisted of artisan cheeses from Westbrook (a Tuscan curd & harvaati-like cheese), fresh flowers that filled three vases when we got home; hand-crafted granola; a delicious long, slendor 3-cheese baguett;
and vegetables! fresh snap peas, swiss chard, onions, new potatoes, fabulous red red red beets.
And HUGE surprise !OLIVES! from Greece that are brined just a mere 2 towns away in Sanford.
The family owns property on the southern tip of Greece on the Mediterranean.
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My sister Michelle invited me to meet her at Emily Dickenson Museum in Amherst (Massachusetts) for a flower arranging seminar.

We met in the afternoon, for an interesting discussion of the role and uses of flowers in the home in the 19th century. And then made arrangements with flowers using design principles we'd learned.

This is one of the tussie-mussies we made - a typical nosegay for Victorian ladies.

What fun!!!
We also each made typical floral arrangements for vases as well.

More Blissful Summer Days: A Mini-Travelogue with Nostalgia, Too

Thursday was a delightful day! The weather was perfect New England summer: dry air, 80 degree temps, clear sky and bright sun.

For us, this was a little one-day, get-away and its 'purpose', if we needed one, was the current exhibit at the Museum of Art in Portland: "Georgia O'Keefe and The Camera".

Of course, we also expected to wander around neighborhoods of the Old Port and waterfront with its ever increasingly upscale bistros and shops. Expensive play things, baubles and bangles; window shopping is fun. We also planned to eat fresh fish for lunch and dinner before we embarked on the little journey back to the train station in Wells. A great plan, we thought!

We boarded the Amtrak Downeaster in Wells Maine at 11 AM on its northward journey from Boston to Portland. The train is comfortable; the seats spacious with lots of leg room; there is a snack bar for food and beverages. We'd do this trip by train even without the value-added views for the sheer comfort of not dealing with city traffic, parking and of course the price of gasoline!

The trip for us from Wells to Portland is only about 40 minutes and hugs the coastline. Makes two stops on its way to Portland, in Saco and Old Orchard. The trip through Saco was interesting with river views. Train tracks go right through the old manufacturing district now mostly empty and abandoned. Great space for development! I can see shops and space for artists; and mixed residential areas, too. I wonder why this doesn't happen.

This area has deep, ancient connections for me. During World War II, my dad was stationed at Camp Edwards before he was sent overseas. It was 1943; he knew he'd soon be gone to war. My mom was in Massachusetts; she had an apartment there and a job; she was close to family and friends. She said she'd been able to save some money by living carefully. So when dad asked to make an uncharacteristic leap: quit her job, leave her apartment and come to Maine for the summer, she said, emphatically, "No". He persisted. She relented and found a room in Saco and a defense job nearby. They had as carefree a summer of fun and love as was possible during those horrible times. I remember seeing photographic memories of that summer -- my mom and dad, he in uniform with other GIs and other wives and girlfriends. And, of course, there is also one very real and quite human result: me, I was born within the year and after my dad had gone overseas in April 1944.

Whenever I have traveled this area, I have felt a tingling, quivering in my DNA.
This is, afterall, the home of my conception!

Our train stops smack in the middle of Old Orchard Beach just a short step or two from the ocean beaches, the amusements, restaurants, hotels, motels, and ticky tacky too. One could easily pack for a day at the beach returning on the late train around 8:30 or so. I think I may return with Victoria for just such a day!

After stopping in Old Orchard, the train travels through salt marshes on its way to Portland; the natural views are quite nice.
We've made this trip by car many times over the years: when I had consultancy work for the state of Maine or various non-profit organizations, when we vacationed with or without grandchildren in York or Pine Point, or when we drove up Route 1 to get lobsters for steaming at the Alewife farm in Cape Elizabeth.

Maine memories abound; living here is rich for us -- great day-to-day and layered with lovely nostalgia.


From Old Orchard, it is just a hop, skip and jump to the Amtrak/Concord Trailways station on the edge of Portland.

We'd planned to take the Metro #5 bus into the city and straight to the Museum which is in an area that boasts two museums as well as the Maine College of Art. And lots of restaurants.

We were hungry and decided to have a light lunch before seeing the exhibit: got great fresh Maine fish at the Dogfish Cafe -- fresh crab for me and mussels for Larry. The Dogfish is new to us and on the sight of a favorite Greek restaurant from years past. Although we were disappointed at first to see a favorite restaurant gone, we like the new quite a lot.

Dinner was on the water on a dock with cruise ships and fishing boats beside us. Delightful early evening. Nice dinner of haddock and steamers to share. A taxi whisked us back to the train station and back to Wells and the short drive home to York.

Days like this one are so important for us ---- the planned and unplannedalike. Larry's nearly-93 year old dad lives with us and it is difficult to get away for more than a day or two at a time.
So we look for BIG JOYS that come in little packages.

A day like this one carries over into the next and the next.

A day like this one colors all days to come with joy.

It has smiles that keep on smiling.

Good Summer Reads

• Reader, Bernard Schlenk. I just devoured this short novel. Although I can't say that I actually 'liked' the characters (usually a pre-requisite for me) but the complex moral problem set up by the author is compelling. Stayed with me for days. Weeks. Heck, it is still rumbling around in 'there' unsolved.


• Without A Map, Meredith Hall. I joined a book group in the late winter. This book was on the reading list but not selected by the group. In the spring, going to a meeting on a work day and listening to NPR (my singular source of daily news and culture) I came upon an interview with Hall in which she read parts of the memoir. And I was hooked. I had arrived at my destination but Hall was still talking/reading. I just could not leave the program and so kept driving around that small town up and down hills and decided at that moment to read the book. Usually, I am not fond of memoirs. Usually they tell all and tell more than any sensible person cares to know. But this one. This one is fantastic! It takes place in a small New Hampshire town in the 1960s and obviously is a MUST read.


• Summer People, Marge Piercy. Larry, a book-collector, bought this book for me a few years ago. A signed first edition. Frankly, I think I might have read the book when it came out nearly 20 nearly years ago........but then again....... Whatever, I read it recently and decided at that moment to return to Piercy whom I have not read in years. A really good read.


• The Gathering, Ann Enright. A British novelist she tells the story of a large Irish family. I was particulary fond of the device she uses to tell a multi-generational story. Melancholy? Yes, of course. It's Irish. But it is a wonderful read.


• Ladder of Years, Ann Tyler. I confess the obvious: I prefer books by women writers although I usually don't enjoy the 'quirky' Tyler characters. I quickly tire of them; I want to take them by the shoulders and say, "Buck up" "Get on with it". But I did like this story and felt enormous empathy for the female protagonist who 'runs' away from her much-older husband and family responsibilities. I think a pivotal moment in the book in terms of understanding the motivations of the character is when the husband turns to the police after his wife has gone missing. In responding to questions, the husband cannot recall what color are her eyes and what she was wearing! Read it!
  
  

I read The Sand Castle by Rita Mae Brown this weekend. I have not read Brown for decades I think! This book is another in a series of books about Juts and Wheezy (Loose Lips, Bingo, Six of One) whom I have never read and tells the story of family and loss and grieving through a day at the beach in 1952. Heck I might read the rest of the series.

I finished Before You Know Kindness by Chris Bohjalian today during an unanticipated sick day. It has the flavor you come to expect from Bohjalian: tight, spare writing. To the point. Without fluff or wordy description. He was afterall, a newspaper writer. And a darn good storyteller. While this one isn't a page turner, it has an even careful pacing and lots of detail in the unfolding of events and building of characters.

What's next on my bedside table? An Elizabeth Berg and a Marge Piercy.

Oh Those Blissful Summer Days

This has been a magical summer.

I feel healthy and strong for the first time in nearly 8 years.

I love living in this house and in York; I enjoy the beach and take long lovely walks plugged into music. I'm building a shady rock garden, the first gardening I've been able to do in years. I have returned to working in fabric.
And loving it all!

Victoria came for a visit. At 15, she said she'd "always" wanted to surf. So we enrolled her in a class at Long Sands Beach. Here she is in the picture on the right holding the white and yellow board and below.

She is an honor roll student who takes advanced level classes; athletic in soccer, field hocky and softball. And,sh is in school theater events -- several times the only middle schooler in senior high productions. Victoria will return in August for a week in theater camp at the Ogunquit Playhouse.

Yesterday, Larry and I played tourist -- something we do exceedingly well. We took the Downeaster to Portland, the train hugs the coastline and there are nice scenic views along the way. The purpose of our trip was the exhibit, "Georgia O'Keefe and the Camere" that is at the Portland Museum of Art through the summer. A fabulous show! But while there, we walked the Old Port for window-shopping and people-watching. Ate fresh Maine fish for lunch and dinner and boarded the last train home at night. And all and all a really great day!

CLL Redux 2 Years Later

I keep returning to early summer, 2006 and the path I have walked since then. It was then that Dr. Miller at Beth Israel/Deaconess Hospital asserted with professional confidence -- no, with arrogance. With definitiveness. With bravado. That I have chronic lymphocytic leukemia. There were no other answers for the state of my bone marrow at that time.

And the result? I became sick. Sicker than I was already. I became a patient. A leukemia patient. I spent the next three or four months: out of work, weekly blood draws and hem/onc appointments. Feeling bad. Worse with prednisone withdrawal. Hard to tell the difference between the disease and the treatment and the withdrawal symptoms.

I didn't know anyone with leukemia -- well, I didn't know any living adult with leukemia. I knew of the granddaughter of a co-worker who had an acute leukemia diagnosed at only 18 months. I had a friend who died -- probably 35 years ago -- from adult onset acute leukemia. But that is it. So I heard the words. And then I slipped down on a deep dark whole. When I emerged, I was a 'patient'. I now had assumed new labels to describe me: 'Sick'. 'Cancer/Leukemia Victim'. The diagnosis put me through a whole host of emotional changes: I was sick;I felt sick. I could name my malady and it was frightening: I felt I would die young: I had bad 'markers'. I was 'fragile' and prone to infection. I worried about being in school with young disabled kids.

Then I started to read the words of other CLL patients: the scholarly words of people like Chaya (CLL Topics) and David (http://www.clldiary.blogspot.com/). Brilliant minds. Important stuff. I joined several 'boards" --- like the "digest" "cllforum" and "cllcfriends". I googled. I scoured the literature. I understood very little; my right brain rebelled mightily at these scientific, medical terms and concepts. But I persisted.

And then spring came. 2007. I finally began to understand some of the words and concepts that had evaded me previously. I read my labs and compared them to the typical 'cll-er'; I found no match.

Did I have CLL?

I posed this question to bigger lights and brighter minds than I will ever be: Dr. Terry Hamblin, for example, who said that it was not unusual for early stage/low risk CLL that presents with autoimmune hemolytic anemia to be knocked back by high doses of prednisone. And then, my doctor, Elizabeth Bengston at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center did a re-take of one of the diagnostic tests (flow cytometry) and found no CLL in peripheral blood.

I did have a host of autoimmune issues that had plagued me for years; I had begun to attribute them to the CLL. But in summer 2007 these were 'knocked back' by entacort and prednisone and colchicine thanks to Dr. Rigby at Dartmouth who was unafraid to name my other beast "Behcet's Disease".

So, where am I now nearly two years since the Beth Israel diagnosis? And what has the diagnosis meant to me?

Well, first, it gave me a new identity: patient. It labelled me 'sick'. But I am not these words. And it took nearly two years to get back to me: I am Pat. Spiller. Woman. Grandmother. Daughter. Mother. Friend. Advocate. Artist.

I no longer wait for the other disease-shoe to drop. I no longer read the current research; I no longer keep up-to-date on the newest and best CLL treatment methodologies. I don't even think of myself as someone waiting for the beast to strike again.

I don't even know that it will.

I don't know.

Who can say?

But I ask: could Dr. Miller have given me the CLL news differently? What if he spoke slowly. What if he hadn't been half-in and half-out the door when he told me? Would it have made a difference to my frame of mind, if he had used different words. Would I then have come to use other words about myself and my medical condition? Would it have taken two years to come around to feeling whole and healthy again?