2024 Spring Lake 5-Miler

This Winter Don and I finished decorating the space we consider to be my office. My nest. My retreat. My hiding space. What should be my writing space, but hasn't turned into that. 

As I rearranged the medals and reminisced about each race experience my hand held the 2015 Spring Lake medal a little longer than the others. It was late January. I knew the traditional date for signing up for the Memorial Day Weekend race was coming up on Super Bowl Sunday. I also knew my foot had been hurting for far too many months.

Could I do it? Should I do it? Our traditional family Memorial Day Weekend party was on hold because Ashley would be traveling. As I held that medal not knowing how many more weeks it would be before I could run I decided to make it my stretch goal. The goal I told the doctor and the physical therapist as I healed. They both said it would be fine if (yes, if) i planned to run/walk it and not go all out. A week later I shelled out the $65 registration fee.

It ended up taking until mid-April before I was cleared the run. The race was a scant six weeks later.

On the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend I woke up at 5:30 am, and drove an hour to Spring Lake, NJ. Don and I did a test drive earlier in the week when we picked up my sheer white t-shirt (why, or why do they insist on sheer white t-shirts?), and my pint glass (which I use for water). For some reason they had a shipping case filled with 2023 merch they were selling at basement bargain rates, so I scooped up a cap for $1, a sapphire blue shirt for $5, and a pair of bright blue tech socks for $5 to help support the cause.

Nine years ago when I ran the race Don came with me and parked the car. This time, thanks to his new job working at REI, I was solo. I wasn't as adventuresome with parking and ended up much further away than I had hoped. On the drive there I heard Rick Steves's weekly segment on NPR talking about going to Croatia, so I considered that a win for waking up so early.

I made it to the start line with 12,999 of my new friends. My biggest complaint about the race is that while organizers tell us to line up according to the time we think we will finish, they give us no guidelines to do so. Asking around I thought I found my people. What I learned as the race started was that there were numerous groups of people walking the race, stretching out from one side of the street to the other. I am thrilled they are getting out there. I am happy they are raising money for a cause, or simply enjoying friendship. I knew I would be run/walking, but I didn't need to add that I would be playing offense for at least the first mile.

I also came across two people strolling and talking on their cell phones. Really? Move out of the way!

As my longest training run/walk had only been for 2.5 miles, I was pleased I could run/walk the first half of the race. I power walked the last half (at a much faster pace than those talking on the phone or walking six abreast).

I know I'm coming across grouchy, I'll add in a few compliments. 

They seemed to have more bands performing along the route. One group said they came from about 30 minutes away. I assume others were paid to encourage us.

The race is very friendly for all levels of runners -- the fastest finished in 23 minutes, 45 seconds. The slowest two hours and three minutes. I was in the middle at just shy of one hour seven minutes -- I was aiming for a 13 minute pace given my foot issues, so I was pleased with myself.

They had water at every mile mark. The volunteers were friendly and encouraging. Scratch that ... EVERYONE was friendly and encouraging. I shared my encouragement reminding a man hobbling worse than I was that we were here because we wanted to be. He appreciated the reminder. I hope he enjoyed the rest of his day.

As I hobbled to my car, I talked to people who have done the race nearly every year. They didn't know why there was so much swag left over from last year. They ran the race. 2020 and 2021 were cancelled. 2023 had a couple of hundred less runners, but not enough to justify the leftovers.

The weather was stunning ... 50s at the start, warming up to the 60s. Slight breeze, but not windy. A beautiful day to be outside.

We want to return to see the progress
they made on this house. It is being raised.

Showing Up

Showing up has been a recurring theme for me recently. Last night I read "The Amen Effect." One of its chapters was about the importance of showing up for the celebrations for those you would make time to show up for their funerals -- a concept I tend to think of in the converse. Today after showing up to hear an acquaintance read from his book, the concept was drilled home again while listening an NPR article talking about the importance of (you guessed it) showing up for people.

The pandemic made it hard to show up in person. Some people were better than others about calling or mailing care packages. I had prided myself on showing up when friends perform or preach or put themselves out there. I've done it so often it is second nature to me. I do admit I've my feelings have been bruised when the people I've shown up for don't show up for me, but that's a different post.

Today I showed up for Henry. During the pandemic Henry contacted me through Karen Miller's Open Door Publications book publishing business. At the time he was looking for someone to edit his book, so Karen encouraged me to talk to him directly. A year later when he was ready to publish his book, I pointed him back to her to finish the job. Henry takes our annual Christmas newsletter, makes comments on it, and sends it back to me. I feel my face light up whenever his name appears in my inbox because I know there will be some humor, and nothing negative. Nothing at all serious, though if he did send me a message with something serious in it, I would welcome that he trusts our relationship has moved to that level.

Henry has a quirky sense of humor. His memoir, "What's Cantonese for Mazel Tov,"  begins with his daughter Sarah dating and falling in love with Mr. Lee, eventually making her Sarah Lee. Today I learned some names and other details were changed to protect the groom's family, which actually saddened me a bit.

Back to today.

I arrived for his 2 pm memoir class at the Center for Lifelong Learning at Rutgers University. I was a little nervous about finding the place since Rutgers is enormous, but the building was located just off of the intersection of Route 1 and Ryders Lane, a part of campus I had not visited before.

I didn't know what Henry looked like, so I made small talk with some of his classmates before class started. One woman admired my RipSkirt and, after I extolled its benefits, said I deserved a commission for talking her into buying one. She liked that it looked as good in real life as it does in the FaceBook ads. Ah, my kind of person.

Another audience member told me I should just start writing a book. Take the story out of my head and get it on paper. Seeing me write notes (which I sadly left behind), she asked if I had a pen she could borrow. 

Another kindred spirit 

Today was the culmination of their work -- an opportunity to read their work in front of an audience. Their teacher, Deborah Greenhut, has been helping them get started. Keep going. Figure out what to keep. Figure out who should read it. Through one on one Zoom sessions, she worked with her students to create something they were proud of.

There were ten people on the list, and a bonus one that was added. One presented via Zoom. One could not make it. The rest brought up their work and with mostly shaking hands, and rushed voices, read their words for the first time in public. A couple had read already, and had more confidence.

The first person was a plumber whose book starts with comparing Plato and Plumbing. They have more in common besides both starting with the letter P. At least two people wrote about living in Iran. One was from China. One is from Princeton -- if I had kept the sheet of paper, I would have looked her up on Linked In to connect. One, the man who was added to the list, is a professor at Rutgers. He replied so early the teacher (apologetically) did not start the list with her. Many were retired. Most wrote memoirs. The woman on Zoom wrote about physics. 

Memoir writing is about feelings more so than facts. It is important to carry the stories forward so they are not lost.

It starts with showing up.

It continues with filling blank pages with stories.

Creating My First Museum Exhibit

In April I was asked to create a pop-up exhibit highlighting the Voices of Ewing project I have been working on. Nearly five decades ago members of the Ewing Township Historic Preservation Society began interviewing people. The technique has not been consistent, but it has been something. Over the decades the storage of the interviews changed as technology advanced. Most of the "advanced" technology of the day, including cassette tape and video tape recordings, are fairly useless today and should be brought up to date, as well as have a printed transcript because paper transcends technology. Though paper can be fragile, stored properly it is easier to read.

The task was to look over old interviews and make a poster. I chose the format: a picture (when available), their name, date of the interview, a brief description of their life, and a quote that reflects some Ewing history. 

Recognizing people don't work at my pace (mostly because we are all volunteers with lives), I suggested holding off and doing this properly for the October event. My request was denied.

As the deadline neared (and life got busier with graduation), the task became more structured. As anyone reading this has worked on a group project, I'll spare you the frustration of being someone who sees a deadline and bumps it up a couple of weeks to be able to gracefully handle the inevitable curveballs working with people who thrive on finishing the project at the last minute. After repeatedly being told I could hand it off when I was too busy to work on it, I did just that.

Deep breaths.

Let the criticisms wash over me.

Did you see the typos? I made all the changes I was given, did you proofread in a timely fashion? 

I don't like the color scheme. Black background would work better than grey. Hmm, I remember saying the same thing when I was told grey would be better.

The supplies I needed to hang the exhibit properly didn't arrive in time. Hmm...that's why I suggested ordering them earlier.

More deep breaths.

The end result for June turned out to be a temporary exhibit. It was hung crookedly 15 minutes before people arrived using painters' tape which was good for preserving the new paint job, but not necessarily strong enough for the boards. Those board will be edited and reprinted. As more interview are collected, more boards will be created so the room will fill.

I'll admit, they did their job, which was to highlight how we are using the interviews to highlight Ewing's history. We had a board that said: Your Story Here and a sign up sheet for more interviews. A priority was made to order a camcorder to be used solely for this project. In the past we used digital recorders, our phones, a borrowed camcorder, or simply pen and paper. Having future recordings in one place will be a great step forward. Of course we should all recognize within five years this great technology will be considered outdated, but for now if we can record more stories, transcribe them (using transcription software), and keep them in one place it will be a great step forward.

Four Years as a Mule

Last weekend Ashley graduated from Muhlenberg College. Three days later I'm taking some time to reflect on the past four years, and graduation weekend. Right now, at this moment, the pandemic both seems like something out of science fiction and a newly reopened wound. Reading what I wrote as she started college really brings back those feelings.

The feelings started as Don and I spied on the candlelight ceremony (which we knew was only open to students). Muhlenberg prides themselves on upholding certain traditions. Ones that are passed down from class to class so no matter when you attended the school, you are united in these traditions. I'm under the impression since our graduation, our state school alma mater has created traditions future generations will share -- including running through a fountain that wasn't there in the early 1990s.

Candlelighting is one of only two times the entire class is together. The first happens during their very night on college. The second is during the last night before graduation. It was one of the traditions we learned about during a zoom session when Ashley chose to go to Muhlenberg. In August 2020, it was an impossible dream so they gave everyone a glow stick and told them to put it in their windows at a specific time. I'll try to find a picture to show the sad looking glowstick.

I'm glad we eavesdropped on candlelighting. The speeches were more genuine than the ones at the formal ceremony for parents and families. I believe it was the senior class president who quipped, "we are the only class to have the campus to ourselves!" in reference to how at the start of freshman year only first year students were allowed to live on campus (plus select upperclassmen). Jenna, the campus chaplain, spoke of their resilience to surviving the altered reality when they started college. On the positive, they were the only class to be able to have cars on campus all four years and have singles as freshmen. The downsides included virtual classes, wearing masks everywhere, assigned showers and bathroom sinks, the constant threat of being sent home for breaking rules or because COVID cases rose, not having help moving in, having an assigned time to move on and off campus, partitions in the dining hall, isolation if you caught COVID, etc. etc.

Despite the pandemic, or perhaps because of it, Ashley made wonderful friends. The people she bonded with her first few weeks of college were the ones she still hung out with her senior year. Some joined sororities. She didn't. Some studied abroad. She did. Some others, like her girlfriend Anna, joined the mix, but the core group remained solid, and I expect will be lifelong friends. 

Freshman year she roomed with Abby. Abby's mom shared on the parent FaceBook group (something else that came about because of the pandemic) that the girl her daughter was going to room with was not moving to campus in the fall. She was also into theater. I connected her and Ashley. Turned out they had a lot in common. Fast forward three years and they were in the same duplex senior year. 

Sophomore year was better. Muhlenberg created SOAR (Sophomore Orientation and Reconnection) as a way to give back the traditions they missed out on the prior year. Candlelighting was one of these traditions, along with a trip to Dorney Park (a local amusement park). They also had the athletes help the sophomores move in (of course some of these athletes were sophomores themselves). The only time the campus photographer captured a picture of Ashley was at candlelighting. Due to the rain, their candlelighting ceremony was held inside the Empie Theater rather than outside. The next day (or a couple of hours later?) the Class of 2025 had their candlelighting ceremony.

Abby moved in with the person she was supposed to room with freshman year, and Ashley roomed with Molly -- someone from her floor. This weekend Molly commented that she and Ashley have had the same hair length throughout college. 

Sophomore Year

Junior Year with Greg

Senior Year with Hannah

Junior Year went by in a blur because we knew she was leaving in a few months to study abroad in Italy. Ashley and Molly shared an on-campus apartment with Greg. The apartment was in such rough shape it made the school paper because the ceiling was falling in. "Campo" was able to patch it enough that they could live in it until December break. Ashely and Greg went to Italy. Molly stayed in the apartment by herself the following semester.

Senior year was also a blur. All of a sudden it was time for graduation and moving home. By the time she stepped on campus in September 2023, COVID was already a distant memory. Traditional normal was around, instead of the "new normal." People still caught COVID, but they took it easy and wore masks. There were no longer any threats about being sent home.

During Senior Week, the Class of 2024 could (and did) celebrate the milestones of past classes. They had a senior ball, with at least one of them (Ashley) wearing the gown they bought for Prom and has sat unused for four years. They hung out with their professors. They took pictures together. They were finally able to relax. After finishing high school in isolation, I am grateful that had that time together. 

I'm also sad the Muhlenberg Class of 2020 missed out on those experiences. Once lost, the memories just cannot be regained.

DAR Relative

For as long as I can remember I've known that I am related to one of the first famous women in American history: Penelope Stout. Born in Amsterdam in 1622, when she was 18 years old she came to America with her first husband, John Kent. Heading for Manhattan, they landed in what is now known as Monmouth County, NJ. The rest of the group continued on foot, but she stayed with her husband who was very ill. 

They were attacked by Native Americans and left for dead. She was in very rough shape -- scalped, face fractures, left shoulder damaged, a large cut across her stomach -- which led to her bowels hanging out. I add these gross details because this happened before she bore my ancestor. A weaker person would have crawled up and died. She hid in a hollow tree eating bugs and parts of the tree for days until she was rescued a week later by a different, kinder tribe. The younger man wanted to kill her, but the older man stopped him. He carried her to their camp, where he sewed up her wounds with fish bone needles and vegetable fiber. After she recovered, he took her to New Amsterdam (now New York City) to return to her countrymen.

Two years later she met her future husband, Richard Stout from Nottingham, England. They wed when she was 22 and he was 40. Together they had seven children. She lived until she was 110 -- some might say 92 years longer than she should have. 

Clearly. Clearly. We had family living in the United States during the Revolutionary War. They settled in what is now known as Hopewell, NJ. I have met some of my distant relatives through the Hopewell Historical Society. Though I could connect my family history from Penelope Stout through to my mom's mom (whom we called Grandee), we didn't know of anyone who actually served in the Revolutionary War.

Fast forward to a Facebook post (yes, there are good parts to it). The Lawrence Historical Society shared that the Princeton DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) was planning to host a genealogy session, all were invited to learn their roots.

Claudia, their super sleuth, pretty quickly agreed with what I thought -- there was no direct line from my grandmother through to someone who served in the Revolutionary War. Just as I was about to stand up and thank her for her time, she became like a terrier with a bone and wanted to search the other lines. I knew my dad's line was out of the question since his grandparents came here in the early 20th century.

Then she spotted a name. Noah Wiswell.

You think Penelope was tough, born in 1699, Noah Wiswell decided at the age of 75 he wanted to walk 28 miles from Newtown, Massachusetts to Lexington to see how his son (who is not a direct line to me) was doing. He was wounded in the Battle of Lexington and continued to live another ten years.  

There you have it. Our connection to the Revolutionary War is a 75-year old man, perhaps the oldest at the Battle of Lexington.

To join, we must provide documentation for three generations: my birth certificate, Don's birth certificate, our marriage license; the same for my parents; the same for my grandparents (though death certificates also work). Only last August they certified that Noah fought, so that part is easy for me.

As I looked over how to actually join, though, I suddenly didn't want to. There are a lot of fees (club and national), but it was the rules on filling out the forms that got me. First there is a standard for how to fill out the dates (I understand the need to keep their records consistent), but it has to be printed on "acid-free, 25% rag content, watermarked legal size paper. The form must be printed on legal sized paper in legal sized format."

My first thought was: How elitist!

Followed by: What else should I expect from an elitist organization. The only people who can join can prove they have a family member who fought in a war in our country nearly 250 years ago. Let that sink in.

I am proud to come from such hearty stock, but I don't need to join an exclusive club.

Meanwhile, next April is the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Lexington. Anyone want to meet up with me to celebrate Uncle Noah and his band of merry men?

Martin House, Buffalo, New York

When I googled the top things to do in Buffalo, New York The Martin House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright keep appearing as a must-see place. As neither Don nor I had ever been inside a Frank Lloyd Wright house, but have wanted to, we decided to book a tour. Though normally closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in the off-season, they decided to be open to catch the extra tourists flooding to Buffalo for the eclipse.

We booked the first tour on Wednesday knowing after the tour we still had a six-hour drive home and at least one more stop to make (popping in the local LEGO store so Don could add a stamp to his LEGO passport). 

Much of the introduction talked about the friendship between Buffalo executive Dwight Martin and architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright saw a chance to fulfill his dreams designed a Prairie-style house for Martin and his deep pockets. Though the finished product barely seems livable, Martin was proud of the home.

We were not allowed to take pictures inside the home (there are some on the website), but what stood out to me was that Wright also designed the furniture and dictated what went on the walls (and where), including artwork Wright picked up while traveling in Japan and sent to the Martins (along with instructions on how to frame them, and a bill). He designed the bed shorter than typical beds because he felt it looked better in the master bedroom (Mrs. Martin did not care for it).

After Dwight Martin's death, and after his widow moved out of the home, it had a sad life. Though located next to an Olmstead park, it was much more expensive than anything else in the neighborhood, and expensive to maintain. In 1946 it went to the City of Buffalo in lieu of paying the property taxes owed on it. Later an architect bought it with hopes of restoring it to its FLW glory. Another point it was owned by a local university, used to woo a their future president who always wanted to live in a FLW home (he left three years later, the house wasn't enough to keep him). It sat vacant longer than it was lived in. Just before it was to be subdivided into apartments, locals joined together to form a non-profit to save it. What we see now is the result of many years of fundraising and restoration. They are still working on replacing some of the windows -- over the years some were given away, and others were broken. The price tag to replace the windows alone is staggering.

Though this was our first FLW home tour, I suspect it won't be our last.

Buffalo, New York

Much to my surprise, I fell in love with Buffalo, New York. 

Yes, every place looks that much nicer on a pretty Spring day, but there was more to it. I was expecting a depressed former factory town, and instead found a charming Main Street with several theaters and many brew pubs, major league baseball, and biking trails -- in other words, the type of place where I would ideally like to live.

They are also located a quick drive from another country, and have affordable housing. Everyone we met was friendly.

If only I didn't know that they often get feet of snow in the winter I might be tempted to move there.