home

The trip was lovely. Caroline was beyond hospitable. Vermont is beautiful. I cannot remember a day as gorgeous as what Friday was; I certainly didn't expect my first sunburn of the season to come there. In Texas, we could not have a day so sunny without the heat being ridiculous. But it was perfectly sunny and the temperatures were in the 70's.

I talked at length about the concert, but I don't think I could do it justice. If you are a fan, then you get it, I reckon. And if not, there is no way to describe the music intelligently. The energy of the crowd was palpable. As they were introducing Helmet Head, for example, they were teaching the crowd to respond to the song. And we all knew the song and how to respond. And you could tell he expected to chide the crowd, to try to get them to be louder and more enthusiastic. But we did it right the first time. We were enthused; we didn't need any more stinking encouragement than for them to just play the song. They knew it; they fed off of it; we reciprocated.

And I have a hockey puck out of the deal, too. Wins all around.

I don't have time to post all the thoughts I have about the weekend except to say that I felt very much appreciated, which was nice. And that I got the warmest welcome home anyone could ever want when picking up Katie from school this afternoon. And it is good to be back to my chaos.

There are times I think this grief journey should be stabilized; that the love and loss of Becky are now my companions the way they will be for the rest of my life. And then there are times when I think that my grief journey is still on the runway. Tonight is one of the latter times. It is not intimidating the way that statement would have been a year ago or more. But it does make me more reticent about dating, more determined to find myself, my voice, my vocation before trying to merge someone else into this mess. (That being said, I spent a delightful hour on the phone with Tina tonight, so maybe I am not really that reticent. If the right woman came along, ..... But at the same time, I am so content to let things move glacially with her. Maybe because I sense a real potential for this relationship that I have not felt in a long time, since Sally perhaps last April and May? Ah, who knows. It is late.)

I am excited by the prospect of the new Sunday school class. I read a delightful book called Affirmations of a Dissenter today on the plane. I would recommend it to anyone interested in spirituality and religion that is beyond the neoliteralism of the Religious Right in this country.

I have also started reading the Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd, who wrote the Secret Life of Bees. Bees was simply delightful, though a story about a girl spending her childhood coming to terms with the death of her mother when she was four hit rather close to home. And within the first chapter, I was hooked to this story. I doubt it will take much more than a day or two for me to inhale this novel; she is a wonderful story-teller with an interesting subject and something to say. That makes for quite a combination.

And now to bed.