Christmas Eve

Here is my holiday letter, love to all and may this coming year be overflowing with Joy for all of us.

Thank you all for spending a little time on my porch, and those who leave comments, whether regularly or just once.  Thank you for taking that moment to write.  I do appreciate every comment I receive.  Like hugging a friend, only one you may have never met.

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanuka, Happy New Year and Peace on Earth.

 

Merry, Merry and Happy, Happy, Happy!!!  We find ourselves at the end of another year.  That time when we look back and remember our precious loved ones spread throughout the world.  I love this time when we scurry to and fro.  Shopping, writing cards, baking, making traditions of a life time come alive again.  That is part of the magic of this time of year, where loved ones here and gone share the memories we make today.  My life has been so full this year.  I still cannot believe what a wonderful life I have, just so filled with joy and love and adventure.  Oh there are downs with the ups, but they seem so few and fade where the memories of happier times seem to grow bigger and brighter.

In January I met Bug.  He was living in Lake Park, GA.  He is retired Air Force and a full time RVer.  We got to be good friends and started spending more time together.  This should not surprise any of us.  After all, I am an Entomologist and he is well, Bug.  So after only knowing each other about six months, in June we took my Dad back one last time to Spain.  It was the 50^th Anniversary of the sister cities.  Bug lived in Spain when he was in the Air Force.  He is fluent in Spanish and the people of Barcarrota fell in love with him immediately.  We had a wonderful trip.  It just wasn’t long enough time to spend with those dearly beloved precious ones.  It is like tearing my heart out each time we leave there.

In July Christopher came up to stay with us.  I had won a flight in a small plane and took Christopher. He had never flown in any plane, and before you knew it, the pilot had turned over the controls to him and he was flying, I mean really flying.  Bug had gotten the golf cart running, so Christopher spent a lot of time taking Bob and Harry for rides.  Harry really loved that.  Then Christopher and I jumped in the Toy, put the top down and drove to CT to visit Susan and Jim for their son, James’s high school graduation.  During our perfect stay at the Grantham’s we took Christopher to VT, MA, NY, and RI.  Then we picked up Bug in NJ who was visiting his lovely daughter, Shireen and grandson Kensington, and the trip stepped up a notch.  Christopher was hoping to get his citizenship badge and had already visited the Florida state capital and toured around Tallahassee and Florida government earlier this summer with me.  We took him to Philly and the Liberty Bell and Constitution Hall.  After consuming our share of cheese steaks sandwiches we headed to DC.  There we saw the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.  We spent a long day taking in as much as we could before heading on to Williamsburg, Yorktown, Jamestown and the surrounding historical areas.  Here we started encountering Civil war history as well and kept heading south into Charleston, then Savannah.  We took boats and horse drawn wagons; we drug him into every museum and historical site we could find.  We visited a total of 16 states in two weeks.  The only state Christopher did not get to on the Eastern Seaboard was Maine.  It was a trip of a life time.

But after I dropped Christopher safely back with his parents, I put on my Harley jacket that weighs more than I do.  I pulled up my boots and climbed on the back of Bug’s black cherry Classic Electra Glide Harley and off we headed, trailer in pull.  Our first stop was the retirement of one of Bug’s dearest friends from the Air Force.  The tropical storms charged up behind us and after spending as much time as we could with friends, the road called to us and we headed off again on this almost 6 week adventure covering 22 states.  We spent a week in CA with his parents.  Sweet wonderful people and I also got to visit with my cousin Ned and his precious family.  I hadn’t seen Ned for about 35 years.  Our trip evolved as we road skirting snow and rain.  We saw one of the three old faithful geysers in the world, a petrified forest of giant redwoods, the Mojave desert, Grand Canyon, Napa Valley, The Spruce Goose, Yosemite NP, Santa Fe, Little Big Horn, mountains, grasslands, oceans, rivers and lakes.   In Napa we took the wine train, a boat ride on Lake Tahoe, and a train ride into San Francisco and then on the trolleys.  We visited Bug’s brother Ron in OR and his cousin Kim in CA.  We visited friends here and there as close as family.  We saw sun rises and sun sets, we drove when it was so hot you fried like bacon on the bike flying across the black cooking surfaces of roads.  We rode up the CA and OR Giant Redwood coast where the temperature dropped from the upper 70s to the 40s in like 15 minutes.  We left Omaha with frost on rooftops.  Every day was a new adventure with places to see and people to meet.  We rode over 7500 miles on the Harley alone.  It was one of the most amazing things I have ever done in my life. 

We lost Harry just a few months ago now.  Rest in peace dear sweet giant Harry boy.  We still have Bob and Edna, the 4 cats, John C Bennett and his flock, as well as gold fish in the lotus pond.  Blessings overflow in my life.  I am back in treatments waiting to see what my options might be for this year.  So come and see us, and know that I am thinking of you with a big smile on my face and a twinkle in my eye.  Love you dearly!!!