Lift Up Your Hearts!

The good news is, there's a new orchestra in town:  The Orlando Baroque Orchestra.  Some area musicians observed Central Florida's lack of concerts featuring baroque music and stepped up to remedy the situation.  We attended the third area performance of their first concert.

The venue was a small church, and we sat in the third pew.  The experience of music in such an inimate setting is worlds different from that in a large concert hall, and to my mind significantly more enjoyable.  It is not as much fun as making music yourself in a group, but comes closer.  For this reason, I thoroughly enjoyed the concert, despite having numerous complaints, most of which had to do with disappointed expectations.  But when your experience of baroque orchestras is Boston's Handel and Haydn Society; of lutists is Paul O'Dette; of harpsichordists is Kristian Bezuidenhout; and of oboists is, well, a whole host of marvellous performers; it's difficult not to set yourself up for a fall. (More)

If you haven't received a call from us lately, it's not only because I don't like to use the telephone.

Shortly before Thanksgiving, our previously excellent phone service started giving us trouble.  Callers could hear us fine, but what we heard from them was distorted.  Back in the good ol' days of monopoly telephone service (black, rented phones and impossibly expensive long distance), if something went wrong, you knew who to blame, and they knew it, too.  Now I can call Switzerland for three cents a minute, but problems invite an endless circle of finger-pointing.  Especially when the problems are intermittent.  Before—possible points of failure = 1:  the telephone company.  After—possible points of failure = many:  the cable Internet provider, the VoIP provider, the VoiP phone, the modem, the router, or some combination.  (More)

Apparently Florida has been having its longest streak of cold weather ever, worse than that in the mid-1980s, which (along with predatory developers) killed off the Central Florida citrus industry.  I was unaware of the records being set, as we returned after the cold spell was well underway, having spent nearly a month in the Northeast, where we experienced single-digit temperatures, played hockey on a local pond, and shovelled 2.5 feet of snow.

The neighbor who picked me up at the bus stop had kindly warned me that it was cold, but with a long-sleeved turtleneck shirt, my warm Westtown sweatshirt, and a heavy coat (with hat, gloves, and scarf if necessary), I figured I was prepared for anything Florida had to offer.  And I was.  (More)

New Year's resolutions are, I guess, a secular version of Lent, though without Easter to look forward to.  I've never given much attention to this observance, but I like Lent, and I like new beginnings, so coming up with a few resolutions might be fun.

To those who know what a bookworm I am, resolving to read more books in 2010 will appear about as useful and as difficult as resolving to eat more chocolate or drink more tea.  However, despite being an unemployed "empty nester," I've discovered to my shock that I'm now reading fewer books than ever before.  I listen to audio books in the car as I run errands; I read blogs, articles, and news stories online;  I skim magazines.  I read books in five-minute gulps as I can throughout the day—on visits to the "reading room," while eating, while falling asleep at night.  But I hardly ever read, i.e. concentrate on a single book for an extended period of time, which is the only way to absorb a book of any substance.  I write much more than I used to, and I spend a whole lot of time researching, but to my shock it will apparently take a deliberate determination to once again be able to call myself a reader.

Adopting the management maxim, "What gets measured gets done," and stealing my sister-in-law's idea, I'm creating a page on which to document the books I read this year—see "Books Read" under Links/Personal, in the panel to the right.  If I also write about them, I'll include a link to the review as well.  And maybe a rating, if I'm feeling ambitious.

UPDATE:  The Second Edition of Phoebe's Quilt, corrected and expanded, is now available.

My sister-in-law found it in a trunk: an old, handmade quilt. Each block was inscribed with a name, often a city, and sometimes a Bible verse. The cities and many of the surnames were familiar, but no name was identifiable as that of someone in the family. Who were these people? Whose quilt was it, and when was it made? And how did it end up in Prudence's trunk?

Far be it from me to resist a genealogical puzzle, especially when it can be turned into a Christmas present:  I would use my genealogical resources to decipher the quilt, and turn my research into a book to put under the tree.  Little did I know how much of my life this little project would consume; I'm certain the quilt itself was completed in less time.

Did I say completed?  I doubt I've ever used that word in a genealogical context unless accompanied by "not" or "never."  But Christmas will come whether or not we are ready, and thus I was saved from my perfectionist tendencies.  The project is as done as it is going to get, barring a second edition. (More)

You read it here first:  Steven Perezluha, who this summer rode his bicycle from Florida to Alaska and back, has blown away the record for climbing the University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning.  His uncle, Danny Chew, had held the record at 101 times; that was broken earlier this month by triathlete Diana Marongiu-Lutz.  I hope to have more details (and perhaps a link to a news story) later.

Steven's record-setting climb:  132 times!

UPDATE December 31, 2009

 

Nothing yet from the Pittsburgh papers, but Danny Chew's website has more details than you want to know and some pictures.  Several other people joined them for the climb; too bad the former record holder wasn't there to defend her title.

Steven and Danny began their climb at 6:00 a.m. on December 26, and finished 23 hours and 52 minutes later at 5:52 a.m. December 27.  Danny broke his own record by ascending 112 times.  Steven's record-obliterating climb was a Double Everest:  twice the distance from sea levelto the top of Mount Everest.

Not all sports photos show athletes looking their best.  But I think I'd look this bad after being awake for 24 hours—never mind climbing Mt. Everest twice.

 

Photo credit: The Perezluha Family

The trouble with being a reasonably regular poster is that people start to worry when you get too busy to write.  When someone in Europe asks your daughter if everything's okay because she hasn't seen you on Facebook lately...you have to start thinking maybe your online life has been a little too active.  Be that as it may, herewith a few highlights.  Recently we have:

• Awakened to a Winter Wonderland.
• Shovelled two and a half feet of snow.^*
• Zoomed down a hill on fast sleds.
• Enjoyed hot cocoa and a toasty fire.
• Played games.  Lots of games.
• Celebrated a nephew's first college acceptance letter.
• Finished (although that's a relative term) a huge genealogical Christmas present project.  (To be posted here eventually.)
• Enjoyed cello, clarinet, and guitar music (though not enough).
• Listened to Bartholomew's Passage.
• Made dream cookies.
• Ate dream cookies.  And kringle.  And M&Ms.
• Watched A Charlie Brown Christmas.
• Stayed up too late.
• Had a wonderful time visiting friends and family.
• Sneezed.  (Some of the friends and family had cats.)
• Played at the Connecticut Science Center.
• Enjoyed a few presents and a whole lot of presence.

And it's not even Christmas yet!

First, our daughter turns 30.  Then over Thanksgiving I had the privilege of taking my first nephew-driven car ride (and a great job he did, too).  And if that weren't enough, today another nephew received his first college acceptance letter!

Next thing you know, our grandson will be losing his first tooth.  Oh, wait, that already happened....

The Franklin Insitute, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

I don't remember my first visit to the Franklin Institute; I believe it must have been on some visit to Philadelphia when I was very young; all I remember was walking through the heart.  Later, however, we moved to the Philadelphia area, and were regular visitors.  For two summers I worked in the Franklin Institute Research Labs in the building next door, and even more important to me than my paycheck was the ID badge that allowed me to take the tunnel between the buildings and spend most of my lunch hours in the museum.

After he retired, my dad became a Franklin Institute volunteer, and it was natural for him to take his grandchildren there when they came to visit.  By that time, the museum had grown an addition, with new exhibits that made it look like any modern science museum, but the kids' favorite, and my own, was the old building, with its greater educational content and more detailed, written information with each exhibit.  Now Dad's grandchildren have children of their own, and on our recent visit to Philadelphia we all looked forward to watching them delight in our old favorites.

The great-grandkids were happy enough, but the rest of us were somewhat disappointed.  To our delight, the heart is still there, as is the train that Dad used to drive as one of his docent duties (it's easier to keep a 350-ton locomotive than to get rid of one) but the "new building" style has now infected the old building, too.  Many of our favorite exhibits are gone, replaced by displays designed for shorter attention spans and lesser literacy.  The math room that had kept our kids entranced for hours was nowhere to be found, and when I finally asked a docent, "Excuse me, it's been a long time since I was here last, and I can't find the math room," he replied, "It has been a long time since you've visited; they took that out years ago."

It took a bit of effort, but we did find Newton's Dream, the kinetic sculpture that so entranced Heather as a child.  It's in a different place now, and has been cut down in size, but that didn't stop the children from following it with the same fascination.  Also riveting was Der Lauf der Dinge, a Swiss-made movie of a 30-minute Rube Goldberg setup with lots of pyrotechnics and impressive chemical reactions.  Thanks to the magic of YouTube, you, too, can see this amazing performance, albeit broken into three segments.  (Here are the links as well, since I note that embedded videos don't always show up in feedreaders:  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

Lest I be seen as a totally hopeless conservative who never likes anything new, the museum's newest exhibit, Amazing Machine, is also excellent, and we could have spent much longer playing with its cams, gears, pulley, and linkages had we not been nearing the end of our visit.  (Heather:  That's what I want for Christmas.  You can turn a mechanical engineer into a joyful homemaker, but the engineer is still there.)

 

The American Museum of Natural History, New York, New York

On my first visit to the American Museum of Natural History I was probably about as young as when I first encountered the Franklin Institute, but in this case nearly half a century elapsed between visits.  The AMNA, however, shows more respect for its old exhibits, and the wonderful dioramas that are all I remember from my first visit are still featured, with all their high information content and long descriptions to read.  I could easily have spent the entire day among them.  Porter found one, the African buffalo, that was sponsored by George Eastman, and remarked, "He sponsored the Buffalo because there is no animal named Rochester, but he should have sponsored the Kodiak bear."  Yes, we're still married; I happen to like that kind of humor.

The museum has several new exhibits as well as the old, most of which were quite good.  There was a bit of a "politically correct" feel in a few places, but it was not unbearable, and in general the educational value and written descriptions were sufficient.  Despite my primary concern for material to read, I am also particularly sensitive to the layout of displays—color, font, background, use and placement of images and other media—and this, too, the AMNH exhibits did well.

One disappointment was the Hall of Minerals, chiefly because whoever is responsible for lighting must have been on vacation.  For several months.  It was dark.  At first I thought the gloom was meant to provide contrast to the brilliance of the minerals and gems, but many of the lights that should have been highlighting the rocks were also out.  We very nearly missed the famous Star of India because it was in the dark.

In addition to the old favorites, we signed up for several special exhibits and shows.  Traveling the Silk Road was disappointing, but only because I had expected the most from it.  It was well done, but crowded, with not as much information as I had hoped and not enough time in the crowd to do justice to what was there.   The best part was the section on silk making and sericulture.

I believe Journey to the Stars was a better-than-average planetarium show (more information, less mindless entertainment), but unfortunately I responded the way I always do when faced with a movie or movie-like substance in a dark room, awakening only at the end.

The Butterfly Conservatory was interesting, though I think I've seen more fluttering in the butterfly garden at our own Leu Gardens.

Frogs:  A Chorus of Colors was great; Heather would have loved it.  Except the part where we learned about the devastation being wrought by the chytrid fungus.

Where Bd [Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis] thrives, generally in moist cool habitats, 50% of amphibian species and 80% of individuals can be expected to disappear within one year.... Currently it cannot be stopped in the wild and a minority of species seem able to survive with a Bd infection as larvae or as adults and these animals likely serve as a reservoir and vectors for future outbreaks. Notable among resistant species are worldwide invasive pest species including marine toads, American bullfrogs and African clawed frogs.

The American Museum of Natural History is well worth visiting more often than every 50 years.  The dioramas alone are a homeschooler's paradise.

This morning, the mp3 player that powers the perpetually random assortment of music emanating from our stereo system struck up Stacey Lynn Regan's, I Offer My Isaac.  Seven years after our firstborn's firstborn made his grand entrance and agonizing departure from the stage of this world, Stacey's song still has the power to stop me mid-anything and tap into deep wells of sorrow.  So do In Christ Alone, which our church programs into the service with alarming frequency, heedless of the fact that one choir member can never make it all the way through the song (breaking down at "from life's first cry to final breath" if not before), and also There Were Roses, a powerful song made all the more poignant because I first heard it, around the time of Isaac's death, in the Green Linnet version—where the name of one of the protagonists is Isaac.

Music has such strange power.  These songs call forth deep sobs of agonizing grief, but it is not a miserable sorrow.  There may be wounds that time cannot heal, but the lively presence of Isaac's subsequent siblings is a powerful healing agent, as is the certainty that Isaac is safe in God's keeping and we will be reunited at the right time.

Without any justification for such images, other than that he was born blond, I have a definite picture of Isaac in my mind:  a cross between C. S. Lewis's Prince Caspian (from the books, not the movie) and George MacDonald's Sir Gibbie; of no particular age, blond, blue-eyed, and almost always laughing.

Here's to our firstborn grandchild, with joyful sorrow, on his birthday.

Some things one can never tire of, like the light of understanding in a child's eyes, the leap of the space shuttle into the sky, and the magesty of animals in their natural surroundings.

As a rule, on most days I take time out for a four-mile walk/run, followed by a swim when the weather permits.  My legs are short, so this usually excises an hour and a half from my day.  Being a procrastinator by trade, too much of the time I find myself attempting to squeeze it in before sunset.

It doesn't help that here in Florida we do not have the long twilight that northerners enjoy, so I need to watch the clock rather than the window.  I can leave home in broad daylight, and by the time I return it is dark.  The halfway point is in a small, nearby park with a jogging trail through the woods, and before I finished my circuit the other day, dusk was well-settled.  I prefer not to run under those conditions, since it's harder to see the potentially treacherous dips and hills in the path—but there are advantages.

Like the sudden, silent flight overhead of a huge barred owl, who obligingly paused on a tree branch long enough for me to admire it briefly.

I continued my run with a lighter step.

Recently I enjoyed the position of Grandma-in-charge for Jonathan and Noah while the rest of the family spent the day in Pittsburgh.   It was loads of fun, but by the end of the day I could identify with Zoe in the Baby Blues comic below.

Jonathan discovered language early, and has been exceedingly verbal ever since.  He also shares with his Aunt Janet a vivid imagination and an endless capacity for story-telling.  Unlike his aunt, however, his stories have a decidedly Y-chromosome twist.  (More)

When we first moved to Central Florida in the mid-1980s, the region was setting record lows.  Freezes, and the subsequent descent of developer-vultures, killed off most of the local citrus industry.  No one who was not here during those times can believe we had fired up the furnace by the end of September—we, who were fresh from the north country and happy to keep our home cooler than was comfortable for our neighbors.

I won't be tempted to cite our current heat wave as evidence of global warming, because I understand Central Florida experienced a similarly miserable October back in 1961, but our experiences here certainly attest to the variability of climate.  It's hot.  And humid.  And miserable.  (More)

My recent visit with our grandchildren reminded me of why I don't like video/computer games. I don't mean I don't like to play them; I know all too well how addicted I can get if I allow myself to get started.

It began, of course, with television.  When the technological wonder entered my home when I was seven, I was already familiar with its delights, thanks to the generosity of our neighbors.  We matured together, television and I, and with such a sibling it's no wonder we bonded strongly as the years passed.  It was not a healthy bond, and I'm thankful that I went to college before televisions were ubiquitous in the dormitories, because those four years of abstention were the beginning of my liberation.  It would be many years and much struggle before I could declare myself free, but never again would the glowing opium box control my life. (More)

School at the Daley household could hardly have been called normal, since Grandma was there as a distraction and Mommy was sick for the first part of my visit.  Nonetheless, I enjoyed my glimpse into the official, sit-at-the-table side of their 24/7 educational process.

Jonathan is not at the moment as excited about math as he is about reading—unlike his Aunt Janet at that age, for whom reading was all right but math was a bowl full of candy.  He's doing well, though, with basic addition and subtraction (and even some simple multiplication and division), and enjoys the "math paths" that Grandma sends him in the mail, problems like this one:

Both boys also like using their Cuisenaire rods, base-10 blocks, and bucket balance.  The Cuisenaire rods are from our own homeschooling days.  We also had a set of base-10 blocks that I had made out of cardboard.  They disappeared somehow, probably in one of our moves, and trust me, buying a commercial set is well worth the $16 investment.  I can't get over the resources available to homeschoolers these days!

The fun is the same, though.  There are few thrills more sublime than observing the "ah ha!" moment in your child's (or grandchild's) eyes.