Life After Windbird, Day 2: An Unexpected Call
Date: Sunday, August 14, 2016
Weather: Hot, Hot, and Hotter; High 91 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio #8, Falmouth, MA
The big news of the day would have been the hot weather, but that was superseded by an unexpected phone call that made our day. The call was from good friends that we haven’t seen for way too many years. They are coming to Falmouth tomorrow and got in touch with Justin via Facebook to find out where exactly we live these days. They knew we were down here somewhere, but when they found out it was Falmouth, they just had to call. The friends are Jim and Teresa Speigel. Teresa was my student teacher the first year I taught in Concord, New Hampshire, and we formed a lasting friendship. In the intervening years, she and Jim got married, they had three children, and now the oldest, Zachary, is in college. Oh, how the years do fly by. But we will catch up tomorrow and Tuesday while the Speigels are in our in our neck of the woods. In fact, they have reservations at a motel that is less than a mile from us. They made Falmouth their destination for their two-day vacation because they want to see a Hyannis a cappella group that is performing here tomorrow night (one member is a former student of Jim’s), do a little biking on the Shining Sea Bike Path, and spend some time on the beach. Coincidentally, Heather and Jed have been trying to get to a Hyannis Sound performance all summer, so they invited us all over for an early dinner so we can visit and then afterwards everyone can head to the performance. Jim and Teresa will have their three children with them, Zachary, Benjamin, and Rose. We haven’t seen the kids since the oldest, Zachary, was entering kindergarten. We are really looking forward to this visit.
Unfortunately, Mark has been battling pain and feeling very weak this weekend. It could be the hot weather, but he swears he is not hot. So because he is not hot, we haven’t turned on the air conditioning. But if he is still struggling with weakness tomorrow, I think maybe we’ll cave in and give the AC a try.
And a last note—Justin called this afternoon and helped me figure out how to post photo albums on the website once again. I’ve used Picasa to do this since 2006, but Google has stopped supporting Picasa and I’ve got to learn to do things in Google+. Even Justin found it a bit challenging, but he worked through it while I was watching the screen via Skype. He made a video as he was working through things so I can watch that over and over until I get it. He is also going to redesign the homepage on the website. That will take a few days, but soon we’ll have it together. Thanks again to Justin for taking the time to walk me through these changes.
