Life After Windbird, Day 3: Fun with the Speigels
Date: Monday, August 15, 2016
Weather: Hot, but Less Humid; High 91 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio #8, Falmouth, MA
Our friends from Concord, New Hampshire, Jim and Teresa Speigel and their three teenagers arrived in Falmouth today and went to the beach with Sam, Jonah, Ollie, and me. Before I go into the details of the visit, I just want to say how wonderful it was to see Jim and Teresa after so many years. Their children are a lot older and Jim has a few gray hairs, but otherwise, we just picked up where we left off when we moved to Boston in 2003 to live aboard Windbird.
The Speigels arrived at Heather and Jed’s late this morning and it became evident almost immediately that our guys have a lot in common with their guys. Specifically, their common loves are soccer, baseball, and lacrosse and they headed to the backyard to play baseball. The oldest Speigel child is Zachary. He is 19 and will be a sophomore at the University of New Hampshire this year. The middle Speigel child is Benjamin. He will be 17 in September and will be a junior at Concord High School. Both are great with kids and after five minutes together, it was obvious that the Goldpebbles were absolutely comfortable with them, so I left them playing baseball in the backyard while I took Jim, Teresa, and their youngest, Rose, to nearby Menauhant Beach.
02 Baseball in the Backyard
By the way, Rose is 14 and will be a high school freshman this fall. Anyway, it would have cost the Speigels $20.00 to park their van at the beach for the afternoon, so we decided to shuttle in the Goldstone van that has a beach sticker. After delivering Jim, Teresa, and Rose, I returned to pick up the backyard crew, delivered them to the beach, and then I left again to go get subs for lunch for everyone. The Goldpebbles absolutely fell in love with Zachary and Benjamin and spent the afternoon glued to them. When we returned from the beach, the Speigels went to check in at their hotel and the Goldpebbles had a little quiet time while I got dinner together. Heather arrived with Mark and at 5:15 pm the Speigels returned for dinner. We had a very narrow dinner window as both the Speigels and the Goldstones were going to see the Hyannis Sound a cappella group perform in downtown Falmouth at 7 pm. The time together was way too short for the Goldpebbles. They just wanted to stay home and play lacrosse with Benjamin and Zachary all evening. But hopefully they enjoyed the concert. Jonah was so sad and he just said, “There’s never enough time.” So true, Jonah. I, too, wish we had more time with the Speigels, but they head home at the end of the day tomorrow. They will spend the morning enjoying the pool at their hotel and then they will rent bicycles and ride to Woods Hole. At the end of the day, we hope they will have time to stop by to visit with us for just a bit before heading north.
01 Speigels, Goldstones, and Handleys
Mark got his approval today for the immunotherapy drug, Keytruda (pembrolizumab). The first infusion could be this Thursday. This opens the opportunity for us to fly to Myrtle Beach next week to meet with Windbird’s new owners, Sam and Dawn Weigel. They would love for us to do a two to three day sail with them, but we will just have to see if Mark is up for that. His energy level has plummeted in the past few days. He turned on the AC in the apartment today to see if cooling things down a bit might boost his energy. But bottom line, we hope Mark will feel strong enough to fly to Myrtle Beach for at least a couple of days next week. He really wants to pass on some of his tremendous knowledge of sailing Windbird to her new owners in person. By the way, the Goldstones are headed to Maine next week for a few days of fun and relaxation with Grammie Goldstone. Thus the opportunity for us to fly away for a few days. And whether or not we go to Myrtle Beach next week, there will be one more week of Camp Oma after that before school starts here after Labor Day. If Mark just can’t make it to Myrtle Beach next week, we’ll try again in September.
